In the absence of income or expenditure-based headcount ratio, the growth in the real wages (i.e., nominal wages adjusted against retail inflation) of the manual workers is considered to be a good proxy to assess the trends in poverty. This is because the manual, unskilled/ semi-skilled labourers exist at the bottom of the pyramid or economic hierarchy, and most of them belong to the social categories Scheduled Castes (SCs) and...

-The Telegraph The three population groups number above 450 million, or a population greater than that of the US New Delhi: Adivasis, Dalits and Muslims in India have lower life expectancy than higher caste Hindus, a study has found, underlining how social exclusion and discrimination might be contributing to health disparities. Life expectancy is on an average about four years shorter in Adivasis, three years shorter in Dalits and around a year shorter...

-CounterCurrents.org Protection of the Ganga river is one of those tasks in which the government can achieve great success with the enthusisastic involvement of people. Then why is it that success has so far proved so elusive? The available data for Varanasi, the most prioritized place for Ganga protection, reveals that in terms of the essential parameters which define acceptable water fit for bathing, the Ganga here remains much more polluted...

-The Hindu But they have to get certificate from a gazetted officer of health departments of States or from official with NACO, it says The Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) on Monday informed the Supreme Court that it was willing to issue Aadhaar card to sex workers without insisting on proof of residence/identity, provided they got a certificate from a gazetted officer of the health departments of the States or from...

-Outlook India Just ahead of the state assembly elections in October 2018, the Congress party had promised to bring a social accountability law in the public manifesto for elections. In October 2020, Ratnu Devi of Bikaner completed 86 days under MGNREGA in her local panchayat in Bajju village in the Bikaner district. At present Ratnu has not received 14,000 rupees.  After visiting the local Atal Seva Kendra she learnt that her payments...