-GovernanceNow.com The cost of maintaining our 5.3 million stray cattle comes to about Rs 30,115 core per year A lot of debate that we witness in the media on the cattle question these days suffer from the disease of speculative utopian imagination of a ‘cow-nation’ and relentless abuses for those beef-eating ‘others’.   Political debates over the question of our bovine stock has mostly been heavily polarising and mindlessly simplistic, notwithstanding exceptions like veteran...

-PTI Ahmedabad: Torrential rains pounded parts of Gujarat today, leading to a deluge-like situation at several places, even as the state’s disaster management authority has been put on alert to tackle any emergency situation. Tankara gauged a massive 280 mm of rainfall in the last 24 hours. Teams of the disaster management department with the help of National Disaster Response Force personnel Rescued around 14 people stranded in floodwaters in the district. “Tankara...

-Hindustan Times Fatehgarh Sahib: He owns four acres of land, farms 20 acres more on lease, and has a debt of Rs 10 lakh. Gurmukh Singh, 44, is one of better-to-do farmers of Pandrali, a quiet, well-groomed village in Fatehgarh Sahib district with several newly-built houses, smooth streets and girls on scooters. It’s a picture that could well be captioned ‘prosperous Punjab’. But the genteel façade hides the struggles of the...

-The Times of India SHILLONG/ JORHAT: At least three people, including a minor, were killed and two women reported missing following a massive landslide in Meghalaya's Ri-Bhoi district on Saturday morning. "The landslide occurred inside an industrial area of the Meghalaya Industrial Development Corporation in Umiam," said Ramesh Singh, Ri-Bhoi SP. The disaster was triggered by incessant rain in the region for the past few days. With more people feared trapped under...

-India Today The numbers of marriage by abduction, the tradition is simple: zero-in on a prospective groom, kidnap him and make him tie the nuptial knot at gunpoint, are growing. May 25 was meant to be a memorable day for Julie, a 19-year-old girl in Bihar's Muzaffarpur district, 70 km north of the state capital Patna. A beautician had visited her for makeup and Julie was sparkling in her bridal attire. Her house...