The 28th of May, marked as “World Hunger Day,” has come and gone but for Pannu Bai Bhil, every day is hunger day. How does someone dealing with chronic hunger view a day marking her plight? Let those of us who overeat at least take stock of a hungry India pitted against bumper crops, number crunching, technologies for profit, markets, and growth rates. The solution for hunger lies in proper...

-PTI With key UPA ally Trinamool Congress averse to FDI in retail, finance minister Pranab Mukherjee today said the Centre is trying to build a consensus on it and other contentious issues. "We are working to build a policy consensus on a number of pending issues such as introduction of Goods and Services Tax, further liberalisation of FDI, including in retail, and deepening and strengthening of financial markets for long term investments,"...

The Comptroller and Auditor General's final report on allocation of coal blocks between 2004 and 2009 without auction is expected to peg the value of "undue benefits" that the government extended to private entities alone at more than Rs 1.8 lakh crore, sources have indicated. The last draft of the report, first reported by TOI on March 22, had said the government extended undue benefits of Rs 10.67 lakh crore by...

Health activists say new policy may not address the weaknesses in ongoing routine immunisation programmes and would flood poor countries with new vaccines When the global health leaders meet in Geneva from May 21 to 26 for the World Health Organization's 65th General Assembly, introducing new vaccines in the low- and middle-income countries would be high on their agenda. A “global draft vaccine action plan”, available on WHO's website, details the implementation...

There is need to find indigenous technologies and equipment to deal with this constant and undeclared threat There is increasing concern in the strategic community and the general public about cyber security and we are in the final stages of preparing a whole-of-government cyber security architecture. Our increasing dependence on cyberspace and the internet is evident. We had over 100 million internet users in India over two years ago. Add to this...