-PTI The entire state of Assam has been declared as a disturbed area under the controversial AFSPA for three more months. The Centre has declared the entire Assam as a "disturbed" area under the Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act -- the AFSPA -- for three more months, citing various violent activities by insurgent groups ULFA, NDFB and others. In a gazette notification, the Home Ministry said the entire Assam, besides bordering areas...

-The Economic Times ARIYALUR: Everyone else may love a good drought, but not the victims who stare at a dim future. As serious drought looms large over South India, farmers live in distress and despair fearing a steep drop in acre age and yields. There may have been a few temporary measures by governments to compensate the dam ages, but that may be too little too late. ET's team of reporters walked...

-The New Indian Express JEYPORE (Odisha): Awareness on safe childhood under National Rural Health Mission (NRHM)  of the State Government is gaining ground in tribal areas, with mothers rushing to Nutrition Rehabilitation Centres (NRCs) for providing a healthy diet to their children. About 120 children suffering from malnutrition are brought to the NRCs every month, said sources. According to sources, the Health & Family Welfare Department and Child & Woman Welfare Department have...

-The Indian Express A good, even if not record, wheat crop along with improved prices brings cheer after two not-so-good years. Dewas (Madhya Pradesh): Manohar Singh Sendhav cannot offhand recall the number of trips he has made to the Dewas mandi or to the shining steel silo at Durgapur, some 10 km away. Undaunted by the searing noon heat, this farmer from Chandakhedi village in Dewas district’s Sonkatch taluka watches his tractor driver...

-Frontline.in The British government, on the basis of an 1891 report on the subhuman living conditions of “Pariahs” by James H.A. Tremenheere, Acting Collector of Chengleput, assigned 12 lakh acres of land for distribution to the “depressed classes” of the Madras Presidency to empower them socially and economically. But more than 100 years later, much of this land is in the possession of non-Dalits, and the struggle to reclaim them has...