-PTI   India is the lowest performing country among the BRICS nations in all categories of the HDI with the exception of life expectancy, which is lower in South Africa as a result of the HIV/AIDS epidemic  In a sign that shows India has a lot of catching up to do, the country's ranking in the Human Development Index (HDI) remained unchanged at 135 in 2013, reflecting little improvement in the living standard...

-PTI Move expected to boost domestic supply, check prices The government today approved sale of 10 million tonne of wheat from FCI stock in the open market in order to boost domestic supply and check prices. A decision in this regard was taken at a meeting of the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA), headed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. "The CCEA has cleared sale of about 10 million tonne of wheat via the...

-Down to Earth While northeast states such as Manipur and Nagaland have shown a sharp deterioration in child sex ratio, the skewed ratio has improved marginally in Punjab and Haryana The steadily declining child sex ratio in India has reached emergency proportions and urgent action must be taken to alleviate this crisis, warned a latest United Nations (UN) study. The report, released on Tuesday, has attributed much of the declining numbers to...

-Down to Earth Blog The performance of nutrition indicators amongst Dalits is improving, it is nowhere near the catch-up pace Does a new government and a strong Prime Minister claiming to hail from the backward caste augur Achche Din for Dalits too? We hope so! But political commitment-or lack of it-has multiple manifestations. In a deeply stratified society like India with entrenched elitism, people from the Scheduled Caste (referred to as Dalits...

-Economic and Political Weekly India faces an exponential growth in the proportion of its elderly in the near future, but there is no specific policy of substance to deal with the many ramifications of this development. What little exists hardly does justice to the country's elderly poor, who are forced to contend with daunting challenges late in life when they have few resources and are partially or entirely dependent on others....