-National Herald Indian students going abroad for studies cost approximately $80 billion foreign exchange, which broadly equals forex received by way of NRI remittances annually. This is a staggering figure spent by about 11 lakh students who go abroad for higher studies. This figure is only growing year after year and unlike in the past, many students have started going abroad for studies even after their schooling. One of the reasons is...

-The Hindu Govt. has said PMMVY will cover second child only when it is a girl The government’s recent announcement that the maternity benefit programme which provides ₹5,000 for first child will be extended to cover the second child only if it is a girl has met with sharp criticism from activists who have demanded that it be universalised. The Pradhan Mantri Matru Vandana Yojana (PMMVY), launched in 2017, provides ₹5,000 for the...

-Livemint.com A new paper suggests the second covid-19 wave had a more fatal impact on Chennai’s poorer neighbourhoods than richer ones Poorer communities saw far more excess deaths during the pandemic than richer neighbourhoods, evidence from a new Chennai-based study shows. Taken with data from other parts of the country, the findings suggest that India’s poor, particularly the elderly, may have disproportionately borne the burden of the pandemic’s fatal impact. In a study...

-The Hindu Public choice refers to an economic approach towards the study of politics. American Nobel laureate James Buchanan, a prominent member of the Virginia school of political economy, characterised the public choice approach to politics as the study of “politics without romance.” Public choice theorists assume that politicians and Bureaucrats who run the government of a country are self-interested individuals who primarily look after their own selfish interests. This is in...

-The Telegraph The state government had organised a Diwali-eve celebration on November 3 and lit 9 lakh lamps, with Adityanath inaugurating the programme Lucknow: On Friday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had praised the way the Uttar Pradesh government had marked Diwali in Ayodhya by lighting hundreds of thousands of diyas, saying “Ayodhya is getting back its glory”. On Saturday, a widely circulating video showed children collecting mustard oil from some of these diyas...