-Financial Express With the fertility rate falling below replacement, challenges of higher dependency, burgeoning healthcare and social security needs will emerge. India must mount the necessary policy-response The time has come for India to turn a new leaf on population policy. The country’s fertility rate has already fallen below the replacement level, 2, according to the latest data from the National Family Health Survey, which was largely collected before the nation felt...

--Press release by the National Coalition on the Education Emergency (NCEE) dated January 29, 2022 An education emergency of unprecedented proportions has severely impacted hundreds of millions of children in India. Prolonged school closures have caused learning deprivation, student dropout, increased child labour, malnutrition, and early marriages that are compromising the future of our country. It is time to open schools and massively increase funding of public education with a clear focus...

-TheWire.in/ The Reporters' Collective * Excess deaths in Rajasthan, Jharkhand and Andhra Pradesh were over 12-times the corresponding official COVID-19 death toll until early January 2022. * Data from across the country suggests governments are undercounting COVID-19 deaths by the lakhs, possibly to avoid the charge of epidemic mismanagement. * As a result, facilitated by disparate protocols, poor record-keeping and red-tape, thousands of families haven’t received the compensation they are due. Last year, just as...

-ThePrint.in Study titled 'India Needs To Learn — A Case for Keeping Schools Open' conducted by Boston Consulting Group and Teach For India, with recommendations from over 35 organisations. New Delhi: Over 90 per cent of teachers in India have faced serious challenges with assessing student learning and over 80 per cent teachers expressed impossibility of maintaining an emotional connect with children during online classes, a study has found. The study, titled “India...

-Down to Earth Experts express concern, point at state pollution control board for poor implementation The National Green Tribunal (NGT) January 18, 2021 ordered 15 chemical industrial units in Haryana to remain shut for flouting green norms. The companies were manufacturing formaldehyde without environmental clearance (EC) and requisite safeguards. Out of the 15 industrial units, 10 are located in Yamuna Nagar district, two in Jhajjar, two in Karnal and one in Ambala. These water-guzzling...