-Scroll.in Institutions that provide cheap or free meals are not mere populism – they are vital for the food security of people on the margins. My first experience of a “community kitchen” was in Brazil where we were taken to try out a meal at the Popular Restaurant in Lauros de Freitas. The serpentine queue outside it surprising initially, seemed entirely unexceptional once we had been served: for one real (approximately Rs...

-GovernanceNow.com Hamlets in four states show how community efforts can combat malnutrition among children. Funds for the initiative, however, are drying up As the trees and bushes give way to Bada Doomartoli, a hamlet of Singhpur village in Nagri block of Ranchi, one can see a bunch of children running around playfully in the verandah of the first house. Their screeching can be heard from a distance. The younger children sit...

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 THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Vice-President Hamid Ansari will officially declare the 100% primary education status achieved by Kerala here on Wednesday "Kerala has become the first state in the country to achieve total primary education. This has been achieved through the primary education equivalency drive of the state literacy mission — Athulyam. The equivalency programmes have proved a huge success and the ultimate objective is to achieve total Plus-Two education in the...

-Livemint.com Once the entire population is covered, it will be the newborns who will get added and allocated Aadhaar numbers—a continuous process New Delhi: The Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) plans to formalize the enrolment process of children under the Aadhaar programme. “We plan to identify clusters of 5-7 schools or anganwadis (day care centres) and set up permanent Aadhaar enrolment centres,” an UIDAI official said, requesting anonymity. With enrolment of adults...