One in three women worldwide gives birth without expert help, a study from UK charity Save the Children suggests. It said if a global shortage of 350,000 midwives were met, more than one million babies a year could be saved. Some 1,000 women and 2,000 babies died every day from easily preventable birth complications - Afghanistan was the worst place to have a baby, it said. The charity urged world leaders to show...

Scavengers, street vendors and other informal workers are falling further behind as the global economy recovers, amid rising competition from hordes of new working poor , a study released Wednesday said. A survey of people struggling in the so-called "informal job sector" in nine Asian, African and Latin American countries found they had largely missed out on the benefits of the rebound from the 2008 financial crisis. "Incomes have risen for some...

The Jammu and Kashmir government has for the first time shown willingness to amend or replace the Public Safety Act, which allows detention without trial for up to two years. The move follows human rights watchdog Amnesty International’s scathing criticism of the government for the law’s extensive use in the state in the past two decades. An Amnesty report, titled “A lawless law”, says that up to 20,000 people, including children, were...

Kerala and Tamil Nadu with the lowest calorie consumption seem to show better health outcome indicators This report, a joint initiative by the MS Swaminathan Research Foundation — an institution with a remarkable long term commitment to issues related to food security — and the United Nations World Food Programme, should serve as an excellent hand book on urban food insecurity. Aside from providing all the relevant information in a consolidated...

In Tamil Nadu, untouchability is so deep-rooted that there are separate burial spaces for Dalits and upper castes even in some urban pockets. “Samarasam ulavum idame Nam vaazhvil kaanaa Samarasam ulavum idame… Jaathiyil melor enrum Thaaznthavar keezhor enrum bethamillathu Ellorum mudivil serndhidum kaadu Thollai inriye thoongidum veedu Ulaginile ithuthaan Nam vaazhvil kaanaa Samarasam ulavum idame…” (Here, in this place pervades equality Which one could not have seen ever in one's lifetime! Steering clear of caste discriminations Such as the high, the low and...