The National Campaign on dalit Human Rights (NCDHR) has said that the budget proposals for 2010-11 have ignored the most vulnerable sections of society, particularly the Scheduled Castes (SCs) and the Scheduled Tribes (STs). Though there is an increase in the budgets for the Ministries of Tribal Affairs and Social Justice and Empowerment, the overall denial continues to be substantial this year — over Rs.25, 000 crore, said N.Paul Divakar,...

A group of men allegedly set a 25-year-old dalit woman on fire after she objected to molestation by them in Uttar Pradesh's Kannauj district, police said on Monday. The incident took place late Sunday evening in Kannauj, some 250 km from Lucknow, where Altaf and two of his aides set the dalit woman on fire. With severe burn injuries, the woman was being treated in a hospital, where her condition...

Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar today said a survey would be conducted to know the exact number of nomad community people residing in the state, with efforts to settle them permanently. Kumar called upon the 'nomad' community members at a public meeting to take advantage of measures by the state government to improve their lot and implored them to learn the 3 R's (basic literacy) so that they could know...

In its election manifesto for the 2009 general elections, Congress had promised that it would ensure that allocations made under the Special Components Plan (SCP) for scheduled castes and the Tribal Sub-Plan for scheduled tribes are in accordance with their proportion in the total population. These two crucial schemes ensure that a proportion of all plan spending has to go towards the most marginalized and deprived sections of Indian society...

The Kolkata Group is an independent initiative inspired and chaired by Nobel Prize-winning economist Amartya Sen. Once a year, it brings together participants drawn from various fields to explore the many inter-connections between inequality, deprivation, human development, and democracy. Its special focus has been on examining ways of advancing people’s health and education. The organisations supporting the Kolkata Group are UNICEF India, Professor Sen’s Pratichi Trust, and the Harvard-based Global...