-The Times of India Chennai: Voicing concern about closures of government primary schools in Tamil Nadu, members of the Samakalvi Iyakkam, a child rights movement, urged the state government not to close or merge schools citing poor strength. They also demanded for the reopening the schools that were closed or merged in the last 10 years. Quoting RTI replies, members of the NGO, in a press meet here on Tuesday, said as...

-The Indian Express Preventive detention is being routinised as an instrument of state repression The recent preventive detention (PD) of Khurram Parvez, a Kashmiri human rights activist, and Jignesh Mewani, a Dalit leader from Gujarat, has turned the spotlight on the provision of PD and the purposes it is being made to serve. National Crime Records Bureau data released in September 2015 indicate that over 3,200 people were being held in administrative...

-The Hindu Fine particulate matter from industries, cars and biomass causing premature mortality. Air pollution could have killed at least 600,000 Indians in 2012, a study conducted by the World Health Organisation and made public on Monday said. That is about a fifth of the 3 million who died worldwide because they were exposed to fine particulate matter (PM2.5) that may have aggravated or been directly responsible for cardiovascular diseases and lung cancer. India...

-The Hindu Female unemployment rose to 8.7% in 2015-16 from 7.7% a year earlier Jobless economic growth continues to haunt India's youth, with the country’s unemployment rate rising to a five-year high of five per cent in 2015-16, according to the latest annual household survey on employment conducted by Labour Bureau. India’s economy grew 7.1 per cent in the first quarter of 2015-16, slowing from 7.9 per cent a year earlier. The country’s...

-DNA Say pictures of PM and other leaders on homepage shows officials' 'indebtedness and gratitude' to political bosses The new Central Information Commission (CIC) website has come under the criticism of the Right to Information (RTI) applicants and activists. Calling it a bowing down of sorts, activists said it was a way of showing "indebtedness" to political masters. The homepage of new website, which has been launched just days ahead of the...