-The Telegraph The government has not institutionalized SAUs which are at times intimidated when it comes to accessing data on various programmes The auditing agility of government programmes seems to have gained strength. After the recent floods in Assam, the state planned to carry out a social audit of relief measures to look into corruption and bribery. This is the first time that any government is trying to reinforce a social audit...

-The Indian Express A collective of NREGA women activists discovers its political voice. As Jean Dreze recently observed, one of the key ideas behind NREGA was that it would serve as a platform for increasing the overall political capacities of workers. It was hoped that people would organise themselves to collectively demand work and, in the process, learn about other legal and constitutional provisions. While learning about the latter has been patchy,...

-The Hindu Antibody prevalence data derived from serosurveys must be interpreted with caution and correction factors The theory behind population-based serological surveys (seroprevalence surveys or serosurveys) to detect the prevalence of antibodies against  COVID-19 is robust. Their purpose is to measure the proportion of a population already infected, as evidenced by antibody positivity. When applied on a national scale, a random sample of the entire population is tested. Then, the data are...

-Newsclick.in Double digit jobless RATe, crashing women’s employment and absolute fall in number of employed have left people in th state devastated – and furious. Unemployment, it is often said, is death by a thousand cuts. It pushes families into hunger, snatches away children’s education, prevents medical care, and propels people into debt. And, if you are already poor and disadvantaged and living on the edge, unemployment is like a death sentence. A...

-The Hindu Chennai: It is the only State which goes entirely by RT-PCR testing, says Health Secretary Nearly nine months after it started testing samples for COVID-19, Tamil Nadu on Sunday hit the milestone of one crore tests using RT-PCR kits. “Tamil Nadu is the only State which goes entirely by RT-PCR testing. With laboRATories in all districts, the State’s capacity is over one lakh tests per day,” Health Secretary J. Radhakrishnan said. With...