R Chandrashekhar, a 1975 batch IAS officer of the Andhra Pradesh cadre and the new head of the national technical research organisation (NTRO), has immensely contributed to the ongoing reforms in the service delivery processes in the government. He formulated the national e-governance plan (NeGP) and oversaw the implementation of its first phase. He has headed the department of
Let me give you a hypothetical situation to beat home my point. Your neighbour’s house is devastated by a natural calamity which spares yours. There is loss of life as well as property. Now, for some reason, you cannot help them physically but choose to provide them financial assistance. How much will you offer them? Of course, it will depend on what income bracket you belong to. In that
Hundreds have been killed in the sudden floods in Uttaranchal as the annual monsoon broke a fortnight ahead of schedule and hit many parts of North India. A new report released by the World Bank says that such scenarios will become with the shift in climate patterns. "Shifting rain patterns will leave some areas under water and others without enough water,” says the rep
In the beginning of the year, the Kolkata Literary Meet-2013, held as part of the book fair, brought together over 50 speakers from India and abroad to celebrate the spirit of literature and the culture of reading. The focal theme of the event was Bangladesh. It spanned over five days and included some rare conversations in Bangla, to discuss the future of the language we share w
Premarital sex is no longer something Indians don`t talk about. It`s not a taboo either, and adults of our country no longer look the other way when they get to know that two people are ‘doing it’ before they are married. What the adults do is simple: they just get the couple married off. Young adults of India need to be very, very careful before exercising the freed
Use of debit and credit cards is no more a safer option. While your banking card is safely kept in your wallet, you might still get an SMS from your bank, stating details of the transaction which could have been performed in a city or a country that you might not have even been to in your lifetime. Thanks to ‘skimming’, a process through which fraudsters steal data from banking card
In the 24 tier II cities of India, abuse of the elederly has come down from 31 percent last year to 23 percent, according to a report released by Helpage India.The southern temple city, Madurai, and Kanpur in Uttar Pradesh saw the highest incidence of senior abuse while Amritsar saw the lowest. “Around 23 percent or more than one-fifth of India`s elderly are known to have ex
Dr Rajendra Kumar is a 1992 batch IAS officer of the Tamil Nadu cadre. He holds a BTech from the Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur, and a PhD from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). He has played a key role in creating a framework on mobile governance. In his current position as joint secretary, e-governance, department of electronics and information technology (DeitY), he is ove
Anyone who has tried to transfer the title of land after the death of the owner knows the hassle involved, not to speak of the corruption. So this becomes a chance for the government to reach out to citizens, a chance for it to show that governance can be empathetic. Imagine the scene if the revenue staff came home to the bereaved instead of the latter having to go to the land revenue o
Delhi University (DU) has been in the news recently for all the wrong reasons. As if the controversy over the new four-year-undergraduate-programme (FYUP) was not enough, glitches with the online registration for admission in DU have left students with a bitter aftertaste in their dealing with the varsity. Thousands of students seeking admission in the university through online admission
India has made best progress in terms of sending children to school in the last five years, according to a recent report of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (Unesco) “India has made the largest progress in absolute terms of any country in the world over the past five years, reducing out-of-sc
With all Congressmen and women waking up to realise the real value of LK Advani ever since he is said to have said that Shivraj Singh Chouhan’s humility reminds him of Vajpayee, and is said to have been quiet on Narendra Modi’s humility, Digvijay Singh is the man of the moment for all reporters on the BJP beat. As of Monday afternoon, within an hour or two after Advani
The ‘caged parrot’ has suddenly acquired the claws of a crouching tiger, the central bureau of investigation, that is. And all it took for the investigating agency to discover it had a spine was harsh words from the supreme court. The swift action on railway minister Pawan Kumar Bansal and his nephew in the cash for post scandal is a case in point. In continuing wit
The government sees in the yellow metal a detriment to the nation’s economy. Addressing a meeting of Indian Banking Association’s annual general meeting in Mumbai on Thursday, finance minister P Chidambaram urged banks to discourage their customers from investing in gold. He also said that banks should stop selling gold coins. “Banks have a role to play in dampeni
The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) recently issued a set of clarifications on the numerous queries that had flooded its mailbox, 443 to be precise, following its announcement of the guidelines on issuing fresh banking licences in February this year. It has been a decade since RBI issued banking licences in the country (the last two being issued in 2002-2003) and keeping in mind its financi
When I met Jiah Khan for a film interview segment I hosted as the programming head of Janmat (now Live India), I was rather surprised by the innocence sitting so cheerfully on her face, almost teasing her naughty image. Bubbly, attractive, sultry, giggly and full of life, the 19-year-old gulped down Red Bull, can after can. “I cannot live without Red Bull,” she told me. She was at e
Tribal affairs minister Krishan Chandra Deo speaking to Business Standard urged that his ministry be taken on board before any “knee-jerk reaction” is taken on the Chhattisgarh killings. Deo, for long, has been a votary of grassroots development to tackle the Naxal menace. And being the minister in charge of the tribal affairs, it is only logical to take into account his poi
“I will not let anyone walk through my mind with their dirty feet,” said Mahatma Gandhi, who laid great emphasis on the righteousness of means and not just on the goals. Unfortunately, however, for e-governance in India and the national e-governance plan (NeGP) that completed its seventh year on May 18, there have been instances of the means being questionable. While
The companies, which are under scanner after common investors complained of irregularities, are not chit funds at all, going by their filings with the registrar of companies (RoC), says a report in the Mint. All these firms, including Saradha, were registered with the RoC as commercial and industrial enterprises. So they are not essentially chit funds. Had they been chit funds, they wo
As the Millennium Development Goals’ (MDGs) 15-year deadline to eradicate poverty will miss the target, a new report by the 27 eminent citizens of the world has set a new deadline – 2030 – to end extreme poverty. The new report has set up the target of reducing poverty through sustainable development. “This report sets out a clear roadmap for eradicating extreme
