-The Tribune A serious methodological flaw of the RCT approach that has been pointed out by ethnographic studies of poverty is that its overemphasis on quantitative method has deprived it of the insights of qualitative methods. There is some recognition of the flaw by admitting that a mixed method approach can be useful, but the approach remains hostile to qualitative methods. THE award of the 2019 Nobel Prize in Economics to Abhijit...

Sporadic natural events like floods and droughts have made headlines in recent times. An official report, which was released in April this year, among other things, shows that extreme weather events have taken a huge toll on both human and cattle lives, personal property and crops grown by farmers and farm workers. A chapter on extreme weather events and natural disasters in the report entitled EnviStats India 2019, Vol. I: Environment...

-The Indian Express From September 28 to October 1, Patna received about 400 mm of rainfall. With all 39 sump houses remaining non-functional till October 1, at least 60 per cent of Patna faced water-logging. * “Any modern city requires four basic infrastructure systems in place to function efficiently — drinking water supply system, storm water drainage system, sewage system and sewerage network system, and solid waste management system. Patna Municipal...

-The Hindu ‘Several States are demanding a register, though they are competent enough to detect and deport foreign nationals’ Before the Centre rolls out a plan to compile a countrywide National Register of Citizens (NRC) on the lines of the document compiled in Assam, it will have to decide a common cut-off date, a senior government official said. Home Minister Amit Shah reiterated his stand on a wider NRC exercise a few days...

-Press release of 4th All India Media Conference, dated 8 October, 2019 Udaipur, Oct. 8: More than 300 media practitioners, researchers, scholars and educationists from different states of India and from four foreign countries took a pledge to empower the underprivileged sections of society by ending the digital divide and create new opportunities to highlight the issues of common people, rural areas, landless labourers, malnourished children and farmers affected by climate...