The draft food security bill studiedly sidesteps the real problem An offending official disconnect with the hungry millions of India has been perpetrated by the very group aiming to improve their lot. In the minutes of its meeting of March 12, the empowered Group of Ministers, which cleared a draft food security bill for consideration of the Union cabinet, recorded this audacious passage: “The definition of food security should be limited...

Increased representation for women can unleash a broader process that can be set in motion by the strength of sheer numbers. One measure of whether it is important to have women in important policy formulation roles is to examine how a largely male-dominated system of government has served women. It turns out that India performs very poorly in this regard. Despite a few heartening examples to the contrary, in general Indian...

The Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act (RTE Act) will be notified on April 1. The Act attempts to address the historical problem of continuing illiteracy as well as the lack of educational opportunities that persist for sections of our population even sixty years after adoption of the Indian constitution. The socio-political, legal and financial aspects of the Act have been much debated and its final form...

The proposed Food Security Bill should adopt a three-pronged strategy that constitutes a Universal Public Distribution System for all, low-cost foodgrains to the needy, and convergence in the delivery of nutrition safety net programmes.  In his latest budget speech, Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee announced: “We are now ready with the draft Food Security Bill which will be placed in the public domain very soon.” Although no official draft has been...

In a thrust to provide sustained support to life-saving innovations in India and around the world, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation is placing new emphasis on innovations that effect social and cultural change to bring down the unacceptably high death rates for children under five years of age in Uttar Pradesh and Bihar. “A lot of times,” Melinda French Gates, wife of Microsoft founder Bill Gates and co-founder of...