-The Times of India DELHI: Despite cases of intimidation of key witnesses being a routine, there is still no law in India on witness protection or to deal with threat to their life and otherwise from criminals and those in positions of power. Many witnesses died under mysterious circumstances in the Vyapam scam. In Asaram case, too several witnesses came under attack. Not long ago in the Jessica Lal murder case, several...

-Deccan Herald Those who sipped a cup of Yashoda’s home-brewed tea have never been unimpressed. The special tea is prepared using locally available herbs and aromatic leaves. Yashoda and her husband Chandraprakash of Biligerepalya village in Tiptur taluk of Tumakuru district are well-known for their innovative activities that include value addition of agricultural produces. Until 2008, the couple were into chemical farming, much like everyone else around them. At a time when they were grappling...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: Landlessness and dependence on manual casual labour for a Livelihood are key deprivations facing rural families, socio-economic census figures suggest. This, experts say, means they are far more vulnerable to impoverishment than indicated by a plain reading of the census data. While 48.5 per cent of all rural households are saddled with at least one deprivation indicator, the eye-opener is how much the other factors overlap with...

-The Hindu Startling facts emerge from census; Maharashtra tops the list The practice of manual scavenging, officially banned since decades in India, continues with impunity in several States. The latest Socio-Economic Caste Census data released on July 3 reveals that 1, 80, 657 households are engaged in this degrading work for a Livelihood. Maharashtra, with 63,713, tops the list with the largest number of manual scavenger households, followed by Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh,...

-The Indian Express SECC opens the door to step away from the poverty line as a criterion for government benefits. The Government of India has just released data from the Socio-Economic and Caste Census (SECC) 2011. It is perhaps the most ambitious exercise of this kind ever conducted in human history. The SECC 2011 has three parts: census of rural India, conducted by the Union ministry of rural development (MoRD), census...