A United Nations-backed conference aimed at advancing the Rights of persons with disabilities concluded today with countries underscoring the need to continue building on recent momentum to ensure that the Rights of the world’s estimated 650 million people with disabilities are protected and strengthened. Hundreds of delegates and civil society representatives took part in the three-day conference at UN Headquarters in New York to see how to better implement the Convention...

The discussion paper on compulsory licensing of patents will have achieved its purpose if it can lead to a proactive policy in the area of drugs and health. IN a proactive move to ensure a fair balance between protection of intellectual property Rights and protection of the public interest, the Department of Industrial Policy and Promotion (DIPP) of the Ministry of Commerce and Industry has chosen to put out a discussion...

Once lauded as a model state for implementation of MGNREGA — the flagship programme of the UPA government — the state is on the backfoot nowadays as far as the scheme is concerned. Even as the Opposition BJP and the ruling Congress try to extract political mileage out of sarpanches agitation, at stake is the very scheme that has not only reduced the migration of labourers to other states but...

Chairperson of National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) Santa Sihna on Sunday called upon the Orissa Government, civil society and all the stakeholders including children to play a key role in aiding the commission so as to bring changes in lives of each and every child through Right to Education (RTE). Attending a State level convention jointly organised by NCPCR and Orissa Alliance on Convention on Rights of the...

The office of Food Corporation of India’s (FCI) manager in Reay Road had some unlikely visitors on Monday morning. Slum dwellers and campaigners affiliated to the Right to Food Campaign staged protests at the office against the state government’s apathy in distributing food to the poor. They also observed the Food Rights Day for the city’s poor, declared by the Movement for Peace and Justice (MPJ), Mumbai division, and Rationing Kruti...