-The Hindu The Health Ministry’s plan for a malaria-free India by 2030 is laudable, but grand pronouncements are meaningless as long as manipulated data distort our knowledge and bad governance impedes genuine attempts to fight the disease This month, the Health Ministry will unveil an ambitious new plan to eliminate malaria from the country by 2030. A malaria-free India certainly sounds like a dream, or maybe an early campaign promise: the disease...

-The Indian Express As it completes 10 years, there is enough evidence to show that India needs the MGNREGA Nearly a year ago, the prime minister made a statement in Parliament about the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA). He said: “My political understanding tells me, don’t ever stop MNREGA… because MNREGA is a living monument to your [the Congress’s] failures. After 60 years of independence, you had to...

-Business Standard Keeps records of deliberations and biosafety data under lock Keeping its agenda, records of discussions and results of safety trials under wraps, the environment ministry’s Genetic Engineering Appraisal Committee (GEAC) is set to decide next week whether it is safe to commercially grow genetically modified mustard. The committee is scheduled to meet on February 5 and could make a final recommendation on what could be India’s first commercially-grown genetically modified...

-The Hindu Giving up corporate jobs and fat salaries, an increasing number of young men and women are committing their lives to providing education to India’s poorest   “I had career goals, now I set myself happiness goals. Giving and getting happiness in return,” says Pracheta Sharma, and somehow that does not sound one bit corny. Sharma, along with two other friends Mainak Roy and Rahul Bhanot, is working on a project...

-Economic and Political Weekly Health and nutrition indicators have improved, but remain unacceptably low. After a hiatus of a decade, we now have up-to-date information on the health and nutrition status of the population. Preliminary results for 13 states and two union territories of the much awaited National Family Health Survey–4 (NFHS–4) which was conducted in 2015–16—the first after NFHS–3 of 2005–06—have just been released. In a welcome development, NFHS–4, for the...