-The Indian Express The pollution problem is not merely a technological issue, but a social concern. Air pollution is a silent killer in India, especially in the country’s northern belt. Eighteen per cent of the world’s population lives in India, but the country bears 26 per cent of the global disease burden due to air pollution. According to estimates of the India State-Level Disease Burden Initiative — published last year in...

-ThePrint.in Model APMC Laws suffer from the same economic problem as the old ones. We should repeal APMC Laws and not replace them. Although India’s Agricultural Produce Marketing Committee legislation was enacted with the noble intention of increasing farmers’ income, it has had the opposite effect over the years. It has restrained farm income. The failure arises from the basic structure of the legislation, which creates the incentives for middlemen to collude...

-Business Standard Congress president's letters to chief ministers of Chhattisgarh, MP and Rajasthan asks them to 'review the implementation' of the Land Acquisition Act. Congress president Rahul Gandhi has asked the party’s chief ministers in Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh to undo changes that previous BJP governments made to the land acquisition law and related regulations. Gandhi has written letters asking the chief ministers to ensure that the rights of tribals and forest-dwellers...

-The Hindu Important bills were passed; but going forward there must be debate on the anti-defection law The 16th Lok Sabha had its final sitting last Wednesday, marking an end to a disappointing five-year period. This Lok Sabha was surpassed only by the preceding one in terms of the low number of hours it worked. It met for 1,615 hours, 40% lower than all full-term Parliaments. This shows a decline in the...

-The Hindu The regulatory framework must be reformed to ensure access to safe and sufficient blood A ready supply of safe blood in sufficient quantities is a vital component of modern health care. In 2015-16, India was 1.1 million units short of its blood requirements. Here too, there were considerable regional disparities, with 81 districts in the country not having a blood bank at all. In 2016, a hospital in Chhattisgarh turned...