-The Telegraph Jamshedpur: Work is underway on turning former Maoist hotbed West Singhbhum’s Manoharpur block into a hub of model villages sponsored by Union rural development ministry, a separate project that will operate simultaneously with the much-hyped Saranda Action Plan (SAP). The ministry headed by Jairam Ramesh has asked the state forest department to study all the 56 villages of the block and chalk out an integrated development project under the banner...

-The Guardian Higher disposable incomes, changing consumption patterns and the marketing might of powerful western brands are bringing fast food to India's children The camera pans in. The grins of smiling school children fill the frame. An enthusiastic teacher, played by a famous Bollywood actress, sits in the centre. The scene is a "remote picturesque setting". And all are munching happily on Domino's Pizza. The advert is typical of the marketing bombardment...

-The Hindu Though there are improvements in employment and labour conditions on the work floor and in workers’ hostels in textile mills and garment factories in the State, “major labour abuses continue to occur,” according to the latest report by non-government watchdogs. The Centre for Research on Multinational Corporations (SOMO) and the India Committee of the Netherlands (ICN) published a report, ‘Captured by cotton’, in May 2011 on the exploitation of Dalit...

-The Hindu Four children have been forced to attend their school here in humiliation after the private institution allegedly cut off tufts of hair on top of their heads. This was done to reportedly distinguish these children, admitted under the Right to Education (RTE) quota, from other students. This shocking fact was disclosed here on Tuesday. According to the parents of these children, all in standard I in the school at Nandini...

-Deccan Herald Students admitted to schools under the 25 per cent quota as per the Right to Education Act, are subjected to harassment and humiliation, Dalita Samrajya Sthapana Samiti, a City-based organisation, has alleged. Addressing the media on Tuesday, Samithi state president D Narayan alleged that some schools were discriminating against the students admitted under the RTE quota. “Ten children are enrolled under RTE in a Nandini Layout school and strands of their...