-The Hindu NGO Arappor Iyakkam has claimed the number of COVID-19 related deaths is likely to be over eight times higher than the number given by the State government Chennai: As against the declared number of 863 deaths due to COVID-19 in six government hospitals during April and May, the actual number of COVID-19 related deaths is likely to be 13.6 times higher for these six hospitals, indicating under-reporting of deaths in...

-The Hindu Centre taking 26 days to clear payment orders generated by States: study Almost 14% of MGNREGA wage payments from April are still pending more than a month later, while 60% of May payments are also pending, according to scheme data. A recent study of the MGNREGA wage transactions in Jharkhand shows that while the States are generating fund transfer orders without delays, it is the Centre which is dragging its...

-The Hindu Government hospitals in Dharmapuri and Krishnagiri have taken selective cover under the ICMR ‘Cause of Death’ protocol to undercount COVID-19 deaths DHARMAPURI/ KRISHNAGIRI: On Wednesday, the Government Dharmapuri Medical College Hospital administration was on a fire-fighting mode, fighting off queries on “rumours of 47 COVID deaths on a single day on Tuesday at the hospital.” It started off with an unverifiable WhatsApp message that was subsequently denied by the hospital administration....

With the rise in Covid-19 daily new cases and daily new deaths since March this year, media reports (please click here and here) on migrant workers returning back to their native places (i.e. places of origin) from migration destinations (i.e. workplaces likes cities and large industrial towns to where the informal and low skilled workers from the marginalised sections of the society migrate seasonally, and sometimes for a longer duration,...

-TheThirdPole.net Farmers and consumers are opting to grow coconut trees despite the national push for domestic palm oil production Jeyalakshmi Palaniappan, 55, planted one-and-a-half acres of oil palm in a village in the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu. But she found cultivating them financially unviable and, nine years later, she uprooted them. Now, she grows coconut trees on another piece of land in the same village, and these are bringing her...