-The Hindu   Representatives of government institutions at a meeting on new initiatives in community health in Rajasthan at Swasthya Bhavan here on Monday said health care delivery should be strengthened in the remote areas and free treatment provided to all sections of poor and under-privileged people in the State. The two-day meeting was presided over by State Planning Board Member and eminent neurologist Ashok Panagariya and attended by Medical and Health...

The Supreme Court stole a march on Saturday over a wavering UPA with its direction to the government to consider altering the poverty line and distributing 5 million tonnes of foodgrain to the poorest 150 districts. With the proposed Food Security Act being lobbed back and forth between the government, the Congress leadership and the National Advisory Council, the apex court's order dented UPA's pro-poor image. It might have been...

-The Hindu   Court wants Centre to “distribute foodgrains on an individual basis” The Supreme Court on Saturday asked the Planning Commission to revise the per capita norms to determine below poverty line looking to the price index of May 2011 or any other subsequent dates. A Bench of Justices Dalveer Bhandari and Deepak Verma, at a special sitting to hear the case relating to streamlining of the public distribution system, pointed out...

Even as Narmada Bachao Andolan leader Medha Patkar on Thursday demanded repeal of the Land Acquisition Act, 1984, the All-India Kisan Sabha urged Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to call a special session of Parliament to discuss the issue. Ms. Patkar, who was arrested at Parsaul village on Thursday and later released, said that instead of an amended Act, there should be a comprehensive Development Planning Act under which development should only...

-The Hindu   For the first time, the Union government will carry out a survey on the use and acceptability of the alternative systems of medicine and employ the results for effective planning of a road map for Ayurveda, Yoga, Unani, Siddha and Homoeopathy (AYUSH). The National Sample Survey Organisation (NSSO) has agreed to include some questions, in its Consumer Expenditure Schedule for the 68th annual round of socio-economic surveys, for collecting...