-Frontline Childhood TB has been neglected for decades, but in the past few years the WHO has begun to realise its real impact in terms of incidence, prevalence and mortality. THE number of annual new tuberculosis (TB) cases in India has been nearly 2.2 million for the past couple of years. Many of these infected people would have been in contact with children aged under five years before being diagnosed and,...

-The Telegraph Thiruvananthapuram: The Centre's move to implement an ecology panel's report on conservation of the Western Ghats has provoked a call for a 48-hour civil disobedience agitation by the Catholic Church in Kerala, starting Sunday midnight. The Church claims the K. Kasturirangan report, notified on Wednesday, will hit the livelihoods of farmers living in the "high ranges" - foothill areas bordering the forests - and force them to relocate. Green activists deny...

-Outlook New Delhi: Under attack after CBI initiated probe into alleged irregularities in award of contract by Delhi Jal Board, Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, who is the chairperson of the body, today denied any wrongdoing and asserted that laid down norms were followed in deciding bids. She said the terms and conditions of tenders were formulated by "technocrats and officers" of DJB and as chairperson she has no role in it. "The Chief...

-The Hindu While the Delhi rape incident saw mass protests for justice, crimes against Dalits hardly evoke such outrage, which is why the killers in the Laxmanpur-Bathe massacre have got away The response by the state to the 2012 Delhi gang rape case was immediate and effective - a commission to review legislative protections and recommend amendments, and a new enactment. The judiciary responded similarly - death penalty for the accused and...

-The Hindu After years of neglect, childhood tuberculosis - which accounts for over six per cent of the global TB burden - is finally getting due attention. WHO recently published its first-ever targeted road map outlining the steps needed to move towards zero childhood TB deaths. The report comes close on the heels of the organisation including for the first time the estimates of the global TB burden in children...