The India Country Report 2015 on Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) comes at a time when the Union Budget 2015-16 allegedly cut expenditure on several social sector schemes and programmes. This year's MDG country report says that India will fail to achieve two important targets pertaining to reducing hunger and maternal mortality by 2015, among others. Released by the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation (MoSPI), the report says that India is...
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A budget to transform -Pulapre Balakrishnan
-The Hindu In the present state of the economy, when there is excess capacity in manufacturing, adequate stocks of foodgrain and the inflation rate is trending downwards, there is an opportune moment for a public investment-centred fiscal expansion Over the past eight months, the government has issued some strong statements on the economy and taken some bold steps aimed at transforming it. As it prepares to present its first real budget we...
More »Disturbing finding: When first born is female, sex ratio of second child falls -Anahita Mukherji
-The Times of India How does a preference for boys over girls skew the child sex ratio? Does the neglect of a girl child result in a dip in the sex ratio? How does one quantify neglect? These are some of the issues explored in a recently released report, 'World of Indian Girls-2014', authored by academicians from the Tata Institute of Social Sciences for the NGO Save the Children. The report, which...
More »Nod to Dibang project shows why present forest clearance process needs to be scrapped -Chandra Bhushan
-Down to Earth Persisting with the current institutional arrangement will do more harm than good The manner in which the Forest Advisory Committee (FAC) of the Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate Change (MoEF&CC) has agreed to divert 4,578 hectares (ha) of prime forestland to construct the 3,000 MW Dibang multipurpose project (DMP) has yet again convinced me of the need to replace the present system of granting forest clearances. FAC, in its...
More »India’s groundwater drops to critical levels -Neeta Lal
-The Third Pole Cities and villages in India will soon run out of potable water if current trends continue, warns senior water official India's groundwater tables are plunging at an alarming rate with reserves in some states dwindling to critical levels, according to the latest report from the Central Ground Water Board (CGWB) - the apex body under the Ministry of Water Resources. Over 16% of the country's groundwater resources are ‘over-exploited' -...
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