-Outlook Aizawl: UPA Chairperson Sonia Gandhi today formally launched the Food Security Scheme at a public rally here for Mizoram and said it would cater to the needs of lakhs of poor people in the country. The scheme would ensure that lakhs of malnourished and hungry people would now be able to avail food at an extremely low price in the country, Gandhi told the public rally. The AICC President lauded the Lal...

-Kafila.org This fact-finding exercise was coordinated by the CENTRE FOR POLICY ANALYSIS. Team members were the human rights activist and former civil servant Harsh Mander; former Director-General of the Border Security Force, E N Rammohan; Professor Kamal Mitra Chenoy of Jawaharlal Nehru University; National Integration Council member John Dayal; senior journalist Sukumar Muralidharan and CPA Director and senior editor Seema Mustafa. Introduction and Overview The first impression of the Muzaffarnagar countryside, now green...

-The Indian Express Manual scavenging laws will need to be supported by better sanitation policies. The recent passage of the Prohibition of Employment as Manual Scavengers and their Rehabilitation Bill by Parliament is a welcome, long-overdue step in the right direction. The bill replaces the outdated and rarely implemented 1993 law, which purported to abolish manual scavenging. It has been passed primarily due to a sustained CAMPAign by thousands of former women...

-The Times of India HOOGHLY/KOLKATA: Sixty-seven children were hospitalized in Arambag, about 80km from Kolkata, after they were mistakenly given hepatitis B vaccine instead of Pulse Polio drops on Sunday. Four health workers have been suspended for the lapse and chief minister Mamata Banerjee has ordered an inquiry. Pulse Polio drops are given orally while the hepatitis B vaccine is administered through an injection. On Sunday, more than 100 children were given...

-The Hindu     RTE proponent's condition deteriorated last week; he died at a Delhi hospital on Thursday Educationist Vinod Raina, who died of cancer here on Thursday, was one of the key architects of the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act, 2009. He was member of the expert group on ‘Monitoring of Child Rights in Education' set up by the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights and a sitting...