PRIME Minister Manmohan Singh complimented his government on the progress of flagship programmes in his opening statement at the national press conference held recently, but was candid about challenges related to their implementation. UPA’s schemes for the poor have been at the core of the government’s ‘inclusive development’ agenda and were credited with bringing Congress back to power. Yet the government is unable to implement well the Mahatma Gandhi National...

The Union Women and Child Development Ministry will map the high-risk and vulnerable districts to strengthen nutrition surveillance. It will also set up a working group for surveillance in health and nutrition at the Central level under the National Rural Health Mission (NRHM) and the Integrated Child Development Scheme (ICDS). This follows a paper prepared by the Women and Child Development and Health and Family Welfare Ministries for addressing nutritional challenges...

At a time when the world celebrates Mother's Day, it turns out that India scores poorly among the middle-income countries when it comes to health care and well-being of mothers. The country is ranked 73 in the list of 77 nations rated for the "best place to be a mother", according to a report by child rights organisation 'Save the Children'. What is more shocking in the 'State of the...

If recent indicators are anything to go by – the failure to keep food prices down, the proposed national food security Act, the failure to ensure even minimum wages to construction workers at projects for the upcoming Commonwealth Games in New Delhi, to recount a few – it seems the country has given up even the pretence of caring about its children or their crippling, unbudging state of malnutrition. Leaders,...

Increased representation for women can unleash a broader process that can be set in motion by the strength of sheer numbers. One measure of whether it is important to have women in important policy formulation roles is to examine how a largely male-dominated system of government has served women. It turns out that India performs very poorly in this regard. Despite a few heartening examples to the contrary, in general Indian...