-The Indian Express The report recommended specific provisions in the ministry’s version of the transgender Bill, to safeguard their rights, protect them against discrimination, and provide quotas in government colleges and jobs. The Union Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment has decided to junk the recommendations of a parliamentary committee report which was the first ever government document to recognise the rights of transgender persons to partnerships and marriage, so that they...

-Down to Earth The next generation of the current poor Indians has high probability of remaining poor as well. Lack of access to resources like forests and social discrimination have set in the dreaded chronic poverty among India’s socially marginalised groups, ironically the target of poverty eradication programmes since last 70 years Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s call to eradicate poverty in India by 2022, or in the next five years, is...

-The Indian Express As incidents of violence against Dalits mount in Gujarat, it is worth recalling the India of Ambedkar’s dreams The steps, if any, initiated by the government through a special session of the Lok Sabha on atrocities after the Una incident last year, have not had an impact on the violence against Dalits in Gujarat. On the contrary, there has been an increase of incidents which the Supreme Court had...

Confirming the rising trend of prevalence of wasting (i.e. too thin for height) among children below 5 years of age, a new report on the state of global hunger shows that during 2017 India ranks 100th among 119 countries in terms of Global Hunger Index (GHI). Entitled 2017 Global Hunger Index: The Inequalities of Hunger, the report indicates that the neighbouring countries such as China (GHI score: 7.5; GHI rank:...

-The Telegraph New Delhi: The prevalence of low body weight, stunting and wasting is "significantly higher" among children from the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes, according to a government survey that nutrition experts say underscores challenges that demand solutions beyond just the availability of more food. The survey, carried out this year, has documented 39 per cent stunting (impaired growth with possible long-term impacts) among boys below five years from Dalit households...