Representatives of around 20 civil society organizations and NGOs met the Finance Minister Shri Arun Jaitley as part of pre-budget consultation on social sector on 12 January, 2016. Immediately after the pre-budget consultation, a press conference was held by some of these organizations to convey the media persons what demands/ suggestions were made.   Subrat Das, Executive Director of Centre for Budget and Governance Accountability (CBGA, http://www.cbgaindia.org/) informed us that during...

-The Times of India PATNA: Will Bihar be able to achieve the national target of raising gross enrolment ratio (GER) in higher education to 30% by 2020? As per indications, it seems impossible. Less than 1% of state's population is enrolled for higher education. The total number of boys and girls admitted in 250 constituent colleges and 350 affiliated colleges under 13 universities of the state is less than eight lakh against...

-The Hindu The launch of the inactivated polio vaccine injection marks a shift in addressing vaccine derived poliovirus cases. After nearly five polio-free years, and with the launch of the inactivated polio vaccine (IPV) injection in the national immunisation programme tomorrow (November 30), India will be pushing for “endgame polio”. The injectable vaccine, which uses killed polio viruses, will be used alongside the oral polio vaccine (OPV). For now, immunisation using IPV will be...

-The Indian Express Indian healthcare providers need to get serious about infection control. A deadly strain of bacterium has doubled its resistance to last-resort antibiotics within a year, according to the report “State of the World’s Antibiotics, 2015”. By an estimate, antimicrobial resistance — the ability of bugs to outwit antibiotics — will claim two million lives in India by 2050, a fifth of the total. India is under pressure to curb...

-Business Standard Says the actual poverty is much higher than suggested by the multilateral lender, adding there is lack of scientific basis in computing the poverty line The government has contested the World Bank's recently released data that showed only 12.4 per cent of India's population was poor in 2011-12, considering an expenditure cut-off of $1.9 a person a day on purchasing power parity (PPP) terms. It said the actual poverty was...