-The Hindu People migrating due to environmental disasters should be accorded ‘refugee’ status in international law An increasing number of people globally are facing displacement due to droughts, famines, rising sea levels and other natural disasters caused by climate change. This class of migrants has been labelled as ‘environmental refugees’ in popular literature. According to the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre, an international body reviewing trends of internal displacement, an estimated 24 million...

The term 'development' holds a positive connotation for most policymakers. However, there are examples abound, which indicates that development also cause enormous misery to the people, particularly the poor and the marginalized. Take for instance, the organizing of 2010 Commonwealth Games, due to which massive infrastructural development in the national capital was undertaken when Sheila Dikshit was the Chief Minister of Delhi. It has been estimated that almost 2 lakh...

-Frontline.in The PDS, the ICDS and the MDM schemes constitute lifelines for a vast majority of the population. Maternity entitlements need to be seen both as a right for women and as instruments in the battle against undernutrition. A government that ignores or undermines them does so at its own peril. THE GLOBAL HUNGER INDEX 2016 puts India at 97 out of 118 countries. The release of these numbers is great...

-The Hindu A more progressive Central law on land acquisition is now in place, but several States have already either amended the new law or enacted legislation of their own. On August 31, the Supreme Court in Kedar Nath Yadav v. State of West Bengal delivered one of the most momentous decisions of the year. It invalidated the expropriation of land in Singur by the erstwhile Left Front government in Bengal, and...

-The Hindu The Management Information System of MGNREGA is a way to providing data on implementation. But to achieve complete transparency it has to overcome several shortcomings The Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) is not only a pioneering livelihood security programme but also a great example of proactive disclosure of information through its Management Information System (MIS). It is the first transaction-based real-time system for any public works programme...