-TheIndiaForum.in The worsening of poverty during the pandemic may well have led to a worrying spurt in marriages of girl children in India. The information available indicates that has happened, pushing back the progress of recent decades in reducing child marriages. The Covid-19 pandemic has disrupted life for all groups in society. While attention has been focused on the direct effects of Covid-19 on hospitalisation and deaths, the ways in which it...

-Newsclick.in The Supreme Court has refused to stay the demolitions of over 10,000 houses in a bid to preserve the forest cover in the locality in Haryana’s Faridabad. On June 7, a bench of the Supreme Court, while hearing a petition on the clearance of encroachment over the Aravalli zone, had ordered the removal of close to 10,000 homes, housing over 1 lakh people in Haryana’s Khori Gaon, near the national capital....

-Newslaundry.com The state’s River Training Policy appears designed to allow near unfettered mining of sand and boulders by private contractors, bypassing green clearance and scientific assessment. In November 2020, a few months before floods ravaged Uttarakhand, the deputy collector of Purnagiri in Tanakpur district announced an open auction of tenders to desilt the riverbed in Champawat’s villages. Tenders for government work usually seek the lowest bidder, the contractor willing to do the job...

-Down to Earth Bihar usually gets heavy rains in July and August; floods in June are an unusual occurrence, experts said Several villages have been flooded after 3-4 days of early monsoon rains in the catchment areas of the Gandak and Burhi Gandak rivers in Nepal and north Bihar. Affected districts include West Champaran, East Champaran, Gopalganj and Muzaffarpur. Other rivers including the Bagmati, Koshi, Kamla Balan, Bhuthi Balan and Ghaghara are also...

-Counterview.net Well known Hindustani classical singer Padma Vibhu shan Channulal Mishra, chosen as one of the proposers of Narendra Modi in Lok Sabha elections, lost his wife and elder daughter to Covid in private hospitals in Varanasi. Younger daughter has accused Medwin Hospital of charging Rs 1.5 lakh for treatement of her sister and not being able to explain the cause of death. Pandit Channulal Mishra has asked for a probe...