I remember being disturbed enough to stop watching the 2003 Hindi movie Matrubhumi(motherland). Set in the future, it depicted an Indian village populated only by men. It gets that way after a man, yearning for a boy, publicly drowns his newborn girl in a vat of milk, sparking a custom that wipes out women. So the men watch porn, fornicate with farm animals. A father marries his five sons to...

Amit Jethwa had just left his lawyer’s office after discussing a lawsuit he had filed to stop an illicit limestone quarry with ties to powerful local politicians. That is when the assassins struck, speeding out of the darkness on a roaring motorbike, pistols blazing. He died on the spot, blood pouring from his mouth and nose. He was 38. Mr. Jethwa was one of millions of Indians who had embraced...

Fundamentally, our current crisis in food supplies as well as food prices arises out of the sidelining of Jawahar Lal Nehru’s dictum “everything else can wait but not agriculture”. Unfortunately, the last twenty years have been characterised by very low rates of agricultural Growth, averaging around one percent per annum. This is almost equal to the rate of GDP Growth during the last half century of British rule. In effect, in...

In the midst of all the handwringing over population explosion in the country, the Indian government might miss preparing for a global record-setting event — the birth of the baby that would take the population of planet earth to the seven billion mark. The momentous birth is projected to happen towards the October or November. But what's that got to do with India? Well, we just happen to be the country...

8 lakh girls, from 11 to 18 years, will benefit from scheme Rajasthan Women and Child Development Minister Bina Kak launched the “Sabala Yojana” here on Monday for empowerment of out-of-school adolescent girls through supplementary nutrition and life skills training at anganwadi centres, ensuring their mental and physical Growth, and enabling them to become self-sufficient. Addressing the inaugural function at Jawahar Kala Kendra here, Ms. Kak said about eight lakh girls in...