Union Rural Development Minister Jairam Ramesh has hit out at Bharatiya Janata Party President Rajnath Singh for calling the former a 'super chief minister'.
Another all-party meeting will attempt to resolve political concerns about the Land Reforms Bill.
In what Rural Development Minister Jairam Ramesh has called the UPA's 'slog overs', several policy changes were announced, and proposed laws cleared.
The Bihar government has sacked 110 officials of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme from service for corruption.
Terming the Naxal attack in Chhattisgarh as a 'holocaust', Rural Development Minister Jairam Ramesh said the ultras resorted to such acts as they felt threatened with the pace of development work.
The direct cash transfer scheme is not a "jaadu ki chhadi" (magic wand) to reform a "broken down" delivery system and problems are there in its implementation, Union Minister Jairam Ramesh said on Sunday.
The government on Friday continued its efforts to evolve consensus on the contentious land acquisition bill as Rural Development Minister Jairam Ramesh met Leader of the Opposition Arun Jaitley and CPM's Sitaram Yechury seeking their support.
Union Finance Minister P Chidambaram's proposal about setting up an all-women bank -- first suggested in this year's budget -- received much acclaim.The proposed bank will lend mostly to women and women- run businesses, support women self-help groups and women's livelihood, Chidambaram had said.
Bihar government has decided to use high-tech GPS enabled Android phones to monitor progress of the rural jobs scheme and keep a watch on the officials involved in the implementation of the scheme.
Activists created a climate of opinion against MFIs, while politicians capitalised on the frenzy.
Union Minister Vilasrao Deshmukh passed away at a hospital in Chennai on Tuesday after suffering from multiple organ failure.
In a letter to Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi, Union Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh has outlined his concerns about the faulty implementation of the Indira Awaas Yojana in the state.
Suu Kyi will be accompanied by Union Rural Development Minister Jairam Ramesh and Chief Minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy will visit, official sources said in Hyderabad on Wednesday.
Union Rural Development Minister Jairam Ramesh hit out at Opposition-backed candidate P A Sangma and one of his key backers Odisha Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik for playing the tribal card in the Presidential polls.
Union Rural Development Minister Jairam Ramesh has worked for weeks to prepare speeches and the Congress' Jaipur Declaration. "This is the Obama moment of the Congress, where the party is re-energised with the rise of young leadership," he said.
Nomination papers of Pranab Mukhejee, for the Presidential poll on July 19, are being readied, according to sources. Senior Union ministers and Members of Parliament have been summoned to Parliament House on Wednesday to affix their signatures on Mukherjee's papers.
Union Rural Development Minister Jairam Ramesh has created a political buzz with his remark that ''election is not a beauty contest'' while commenting on reports on the pitching of Rahul Gandhi and Narendra Modi for the 2014 general elections by their respective parties.
Rural Development Minister Jairam Ramesh believes that renaming the Land Acquisition Bill was felt necessary to eliminate the danger of the price spiralling once the first land is acquired in an area.
Congress party circles are talking about a major Cabinet reshuffle on September 18. Rural Development Minister Jairam Ramesh, Public Health Minister Gulam Nabi Azad and Social Justice Minister Mukul Wasnik are said to be tipped for party organisational work, while party spokesman Janardan Dwivedi and his junior Manish Tiwari are likely to be included in the Union Cabinet.
Sinha had earlier charged Jairam of discriminating against states that were ruled by the Bharatiya Janata Party.
Bihar Rural Development Minister Nitish Mishra on Monday ordered an inquiry into the allegations that nearly 73 per cent of the funds allotted for implementation of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act in 38 districts of Bihar, between 2006 and 2012, have been embezzled by authorities.
"Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Amit Shah (Home Minister) and our national President J P Nadda have a special love and faith towards me. You are aware that no position has been given to those who have crossed 75 years of age, but appreciating my work they have given me an opportunity despite me crossing 78 years," Yediyurappa said.
India has assured Bangladesh that agreements on the Teesta Water Treaty and demarcation of land boundaries will soon become a reality.
Not all ministers are on board on certain critical provisions, want revision.
The move to resume work in ministries comes nearly a month after the government issued work from home protocols in its fight against the coronavirus pandemic.
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee strongly retorted as 'distasteful' the taunt by Rural Development Minister Jairam Ramesh while releasing the fourth installment of Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Gurantee Act funds to her state that 'this reflects how sensitive the so-called 'brain-dead government in Delhi' is to the needs of the people of West Bengal'.
Rural Development Minister Jairam Ramesh on Thursday met Jan Satyagrah activists and agreed to their demands for framing a National Land Reforms Policy, defusing a crisis that could have been triggered by their march to the national capital.
Rejecting Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Mayawati's charge that his demand for Central Bureau of Investigation probe into Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act implementation was "politically motivated", Rural Development Minister Jairam Ramesh on Friday said he would not hesitate to recommend similar investigation even in Congress-ruled states.
Union Rural Development Minister Jairam Ramesh on Thursday said it was not possible to cancel all the coal block allocations but asserted that no one, even if a minister or a senior official, would be spared if found involved in the coal scam.
The reshuffle had politics at its heart, so the biggest complement of new ministers, both Cabinet rank and below, came from UP, which will see assembly elections in a few months.
Several Congress ministers have reportedly said that they want to be relieved of their ministerial berths. These include Rural Development Minister Jairam Ramesh, Law Minister Salman Khurshid, Overseas Affairs Minister Vayalar Ravi and Health and Family Welfare Minister Ghulam Nabi Azad.
An Empowered Group of Ministers on drought headed by Sharad Pawar on Friday sanctioned Rs 480 crore as immediate relief to Gujarat for rural drinking water and also announced increase of man days under MGNREGA from 100 to 150 per person.
Union Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar on Wednesday began his three-day tour to take stock of four drought-hit states of Maharashtra, Gujarat, Rajasthan and Karnataka.
This will be the last visit of Zoellick as President of World Bank as he is retiring on June 30.
The Bharatiya Janata P arty core group will meet on Saturday to take a decision on replacing Karnataka Chief Minister Sadananda Gowda with Lingayat leader Jagadish Shettar and finalise the strategy for the vice presidential election.
On one hand Karnataka Agriculture Minister Umesh Katti, Water Resources Minister Basavaraj Bommai and Rural Development Minister Jagadish Shettar are plotting the fall of Chief Minister Sadananda Gowda, while on the other hand the state continues to reel under drought with 123 taluks declared as drought hit.
Stepping up pressure over their demand for change in the leadership in Karnataka, seven Ministers on Friday met former Chief Minister B S Yeddyurappa and discussed the political situation amid reports that they planned to quit the Bharatiya Janata Party ministry.
"Making of toilets and having faith in a religious place of worship are two different things. India is a multicultural country where we should have unblemished faith in a temple, a mosque, a gurudwara or a church. You cannot juxtapose the two," BJP spokesperson Rajiv Pratap Rudy said.
Ramesh wants Maharashtra to be a pace setter.
The National Level Monitors have pointed out grave irregularities in the NREGA scheme in Uttar Pradesh.
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