-Centre for Science and Environment It is becoming clearer by the day that chemical fertilizers are not a sustainable solution to the problem of depletion of soil nutrients as a result of agriculture, particularly crop production. Biofertilizers and organic fertilizers not only provide nutrients to crops, they also help in restoring soil health and ecological balance. As we (re)discover the power and potential of biofertilizers and organic fertilizers, we need to...

On Janaushadhi Diwas this year (i.e., March 7th, 2022), Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi stated that the poor and the middle-class benefited from the 'Jan Aushadhi Kendras' that were set up to provide generic drugs at affordable prices. He said that the poor and the middle class saved around Rs.13,000 crore through these stores during the COVID-19 pandemic. In the wake of COVID 19 crisis, the 'Bureau of Pharma PSUs of India'...

-The Hindu “The current version of the text added new burdensome conditions that would impose additional limits on countries using non-voluntary licensing” Six experts from India, South Africa and the United States have written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi to reject the current version of a proposal at the World Trade Organisation on intellectual property waivers for COVID-19 medicines, that includes vaccines, drugs and diagnostics. In October 2020, at the WTO’s Trade Related...

-The Hindu CIC rules information not exempted under Right to Information Act, Union Home Ministry says records destroyed every six months. Even as the controversy over the Government of India allegedly deploying Pegasus spyware to snoop on top politicians, journalists, activists etc refuses to die down, the Ministry of Home Affairs has sprung a surprise saying it maintains no data of lawful interceptions made by authorised intelligence/law–enforcing agencies. In a written submission before...

-The Telegraph An interview with the Alt News co-founder on his new Kolkata office, his fact-checking mission and more Alt News, the popular fact-checking website, has recently opened an office in Kolkata. Pratik Sinha, the co-founder of the site, has shifted to the city to spearhead Alt News’s activities here. My Kolkata spoke to Sinha about his fight against both misinformation and disinformation, which is deliberate deception; his vision for Alt News;...