Reportage on a planet without equitable or sustainable development.
P Chidambaram interview: Minimum income plan aims to wipe out poverty, MGNREGA had limited objective
On January 28, Congress president Rahul Gandhi announced the party is “committed to a Minimum Income Guarantee for every poor person”.
His brief announcement raised more questions than answers. The financial scale of a scheme that gives a monthly income to the poor in India will be huge. Therefore, how will it be funded? If the programme is funded by, as the Economic Survey had suggested, axing existing welfare programmes, the State’s developmental role will suffer. There is also the risk of competitive populism as other political parties and states follow suit, with a progressive hollowing of the State if they redirect funds to their income support programmes.
Trying to understand what the Congress is planning, Scroll.in contacted former Finance Minister P Chidambaram, who is said to be leading the party’s thinking on income support schemes.
I am an Indian journalist with interests in energy, environment, climate and India’s ongoing slide into right-wing authoritarianism. My book, Despite the State, an examination of pervasive state failure and democratic decay in India, was published by Westland Publications, India, in January 2021. My work has won the Bala Kailasam Memorial Award; the Ramnath Goenka Excellence in Journalism Award; and five Shriram Awards for Excellence in Financial Journalism. Write to me at despitethestate@protonmail.com.
“Westland closure: Titles that are selling fast and a few personal recommendations,” by Chetana Divya Vasudev, Moneycontrol. (Because this happened too. In February, a year after DtS was released, Amazon decided to shutter Westland, which published the book. The announcement saw folks rushing to buy copies of Westland books before stocks run out.)
Fractured/Earth 
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