School feeding programmes, which provide meals so that millions of children in poor countries can attend classes, can be broadened to reach even more pupils with the help of donors and partnerships, the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) said today as it called for increased international support. Nancy Walters, the chief of school feeding policy at WFP, told a New York forum on hunger that the programmes have many...

That hospital births curb mother and child deaths is probably a no brainer. Convincing expectant mothers to get admitted to a hospital is only part of the problem in India’s rural healthcare system. The other challenge is abysmal infrastructure: There is just one hospital bed for every 10,000 Indians living in villages and one in 10 primary health centres in rural areas stumble along without doctors. The result is a human tragedy....

While the landmark Right to Education Act takes the promise of primary education to more than eight million children, there are still many lacunae on the ground. But, as the Shiksha Adhikar Yatra, conducted by Dalit organisations in UP and Rajasthan showed, citizens now have the tools to demand and receive effective governance.  The landmark right to information act has made a huge impact at the local level on the...

A gang that kidnapped minor girls to force them into prostitution has been detected at the intervention of the Delhi Commission for Protection of Child Rights. Seven people have been arrested for abduction and child prostitution and four minor girls, who had been kidnapped from Sultanpuri in Delhi, have been rescued. On taking up investigations into the case, the DCPCR found that young girls were kidnapped from Delhi's Sultanpuri area in...

Nine of 10 mud-eating children are in the last stage of malnutrition. Eight of 10 people are deprived of every national social-security net and live with starvation and hunger. The average life span is 40 In April, the Hindustan Times revealed acute deprivation in the Uttar Pradesh village of Ganne, part of the former constituency of India’s first Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru.   Now, a Supreme Court inquiry team that visited the area...