The government has written to all states to ensure better sanitation facilities, including separate toilets and free napkins, to check the increasing dropout rate among girls once they reach puberty. In a letter to all state secretaries, the rural development ministry has asked state governments to scale up the School Sanitation and Health Hygiene Education (SSHHE) programme under the ministry’s total sanitation campaign. Written by J.S. Mathur, joint secretary, department of drinking...

Human trafficking is one of the most lucrative illicit businesses in Europe, according to a United Nations report launched today at an event where Spain became the first country on the continent to join the UN Blue Heart Campaign against trafficking in people. The report Trafficking in persons to Europe for sexual exploitation, issued by the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), shows that criminal groups make around $3 billion per...

The National Human Rights Commission has issued a notice to the Union Home Secretary seeking a factual report on the news that security forces carried the bodies of dead Naxalites, including women, with their hands and feet tied to bamboo poles in West Bengal. The Commission issued the notice after taking suo motu cognisance of the news and photographs that appeared in the media on June 18 wherein it was shown...

By noon daily, the reception area of Surya Clinic in Muzaffarpur district of Bihar begins to fill up. Patients admitted for gyanecological care are clothed in the blue robes of the hospital and ushered into clean rooms with freshly made beds. At the state-run primary health centre (PHC) in Bochahan block of Muzaffarpur, which also offers family planning services, disposable gloves are washed and re-used and rusted beds are covered with...

Internationally renowned fashion designer and former supermodel Bibi Russell has joined hands with the ethnic Bodo women of the northeastern Indian state of Assam in creating a new line of lifestyle products that will blend traditional Bodo culture and high fashion. Bibi Russell, who was associated with leading international brands and fashion shows in the 1970s and 80s, will train Bodo women working for Weaving Destination in modern design techniques and...