-Press Information Bureau The India Rural Development Report 2012/13 was released here by Shri Jairam Ramesh, Minister for Rural Development, Government of India. The Report was prepared by IDFC Foundation in collaboration with network partners, the Centre for Economic and Social Studies (CESS), the Institute for Rural Management Anand (IRMA), and the Indira Gandhi Institute of Development Research (IGIDR), with contributions from several other researchers, experts and civil society organisations. On...

-Outlook Thane: Maharashtra's Minister for Tribal Development Madhukar Pichad admitted here on Monday that large scale malnutrition deaths occurred in Thane district of Maharashtra due to non-availability of proper medical infrastructure and healthcare facilities. Pichad said this while visiting the predominently tribal Jawhar and Mokhada talukas of Thane district on Monday, where large scale child deaths have been reported since the last three months. It may be recalled that it was way back...

-Down to Earth   Despite high cost of treatment, private sector still takes care of 80 per cent of all outpatient care and about 60 per cent of all inpatient care A study on healthcare costs in India has reaffirmed what everyone knows-that private hospitals are not affordable for the common man. Getting treatment in these hospitals is at least 20 times costlier than the healthcare provided in district government hospitals, reveals the...

-Frontline The National Advisory Council recommendations seem to be making a strong case for a major role for the private sector in the delivery of health care. THE recommendations for universal health coverage drawn up by the National Advisory Council (NAC), headed by United Progressive Alliance (UPA) chairperson Sonia Gandhi, push for public-private partnerships (PPPs) in the health delivery system but not for any inbuilt mechanisms for accountability. The NAC also...

-PTI NEW DELHI: Nobel laureate economist Amartya Sen, who has been critical of Narendra Modi's model of governance, has said there are lessons to be learnt even from Gujarat which had good business performance and infrastructure though it lagged in health, literary and minority rights. Sen, at the same time, pointed that there are bigger things to learn from Kerala, Tamil Nadu and even Himachal Pradesh, a state where he said "transformation...