-Livemint.com Consumption declined over the period 2014-18, confirming fears that people ended up worse off Various data from the financial to the corporate sector over the last two months are confirming the worst fears of a sharp decline in demand in the economy. With stagnant investment and exports, there are clear signs of a sustained slowdown. Most of this was well known to anybody following the Indian economy, barring the government, which...

-Newslaundry.com Out of 121 leadership positions surveyed in newsrooms, none are held by those belonging to Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes. Three out of every four anchors of flagship debates are upper caste. Not one is Dalit, Adivasi, or OBC. Only 10 of the 972 articles featuring on the cover pages of the 12 magazines are about issues related to caste. No more than 5 per cent of all articles in English...

-Newslaundry.com The number of women in top leadership positions across Indian newsrooms stood at 13.6 per cent for magazines, 20.9 per cent for TV channels, 26.3 per cent for digital portals and less than 5 per cent for newspapers. The media industry has long championed the cause of women’s representation—from women’s entry into Sabarimala to the Women’s Reservation Bill. However, they seem to have done little to ensure adequate representation in their...

-The Telegraph Country fails to achieve infection-control New Delhi: Gaps in immunisation have kept India out of the list of four countries announced by the World Health Organisation (WHO) on Friday as having achieved control of hepatitis-B virus infections. The WHO said Bangladesh, Bhutan, Nepal and Thailand have achieved hepatitis-B control with the prevalence of the disease dropping to less than one per cent among five-year old children, the criteria for control applied...

--The Indian Express PMGSY was rolled out in 2000 to provide access to all-weather roads in 1.78 lakh rural habitations across the country. New Delhi: A recent independent World Bank assessment of the Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana (PMGSY) rural roads programme meant to establish ‘farm to market connectivity’ shows that the PMGSY roads, in fact, “triggered a shift from farm to non-farm employment” in the habitations studied between 2009 and...