As in most social sector indicators, Kerala tops the national child rights index, followed by Karnataka. Arunachal Pradesh is the worst performer in protecting the rights of children. Strangely, Kerala's child marriage indicator is the lowest, and the State's performance is far from satisfactory in early childhood care and crimes against children. One point that stands out in the indexing — the first of its kind in the country — is that...

It has to be but a means to development, not an end in itself Is India doing marvellously well, or is it failing terribly? Depending on whom you speak to, you could pick up either of those answers with some frequency. One story, very popular among a minority but a large enough group—of Indians who are doing very well (and among the media that cater largely to them)—runs something like...

-The Economist   The world’s population will reach 7 billion at the end of October. Don’t panic IN 1950 the whole population of the earth—2.5 billion—could have squeezed, shoulder to shoulder, onto the Isle of Wight, a 381-square-kilometre rock off southern England. By 1968 John Brunner, a British novelist, observed that the earth’s people—by then 3.5 billion—would have required the Isle of Man, 572 square kilometres in the Irish Sea, for its standing...

Amid policy battles over food production, energy resources and economic decline, one untapped natural resource that is guaranteed to boost production on a global scale has been stubbornly overlooked – the power of women in the labour force. According to the World Bank's 2012 World Development Report (WDR) "Gender Equality and Development", ensuring equal access for women farmers would increase maize yields by 11 to 16 percent in Malawi and 17...

At a time when civil society groups are playing an adversarial role in relation to the Union government, those civil society members who have been given an institutional role in the government have become pro-active: in the last few days, the Sonia Gandhi-led National Advisory Council (NAC) has written three letters to the government on a range of social sector issues. The three communications relate to the NAC's recommendations on a...