-PTI Kolkata: Retired sex workers from Asia's largest red-light district of Kolkata's Sonagachi, who are forced to live a life of penury after falling out of favour with customers because of advanced age, would soon be rehabilitated in a new home. As part of the West Bengal government's plan to rehabilitate disabled, sick and old sex workers living in Kolkata, two buildings would house the rehabilitation centres which would have all facilities...

-The Hindustan Times The December 16 gang rape, which rocked the country last year, had raised questions on the loopholes in policing across the country. However, what escaped attention was the crippling lack of infrastructure that leads to insecurity among the city's women. A lot was promised soon after the horrific incident, but very little has been done yet. NGOs working for the welfare of women have highlighted how our urban planning,...

-The Hindu     With the closing of relief camps in Muzaffarnagar, even the meagre food support has disappeared. As the winter cold descends this year on Muzaffarnagar and Shamli districts in Western U.P., some 20,000 people will camp in makeshift unofficial camps amidst squalor and official neglect, or survive in small rented tenements or with relatives - exiles from the villages of their birth. Three months after one of the grimmest communal outbreaks...

-The Times of India As the clock ticks towards the general elections in a few months time, a major crack appears to be opening up in the government. The mandarins of finance ministry - presumably with the sanction of finance minister P Chidambaram - have proposed huge cuts amounting to over Rs 20,000 crore in spending on popular flagship schemes like the employment guarantee scheme, the rural housing scheme, the village...

-The Telegraph Kolkata: An NGO set up in response to the 2002 carnage in Gujarat has decided to carry out awareness programmes across the country in the run-up to the 2014 Lok Sabha elections to highlight the potential pitfalls of Narendra Modi becoming Prime Minister. "A dream of development is being shown to the people of India.... But that is not the reality. There is another side to the story of Gujarat,...