-The Hindu Centre for Politics and Public Policy Menstrual hygiene, an essential building block of a woman’s health, suffers wanton neglect in India’s public discourse. Though public policies are in place, the progress made by India’s government, private, and civil society sectors is not in sync with the nation’s aspiration to be a global economic superpower. R. Sujatha, consultant on gender issues, and R. Gopinath, development economist, critique the steps taken,...

-The Hindu Malnutrition is a complex problem and results from not getting enough food to not getting the right kind of food, says the United Nations WFP (India) Country Director Even with the world's largest subsidised food distribution systems serving 65 million poor families across the country, India continues to be home to a quarter of all malnourished people worldwide. In view of the incredible challenge of improving nutrition for all people...

-Hindustan Times Increasing rates of girls’ education, proactive government investments in adolescent girls, and strong public messaging around the illegality of child marriage and the harm it causes attributed to the shift. From one in four to approximately one in five, child marriages have seen a decline world over in the past 10 years, a Unicef report released on Monday said. The proportion of women who were married as children decreased by 15%...

-Livemint.com To stabilize crop prices and make them remunerative, the Swaminathan Commission proposed significant improvements in the implementation of MSPs Across the country, farmers are furious—and rightfully so. Four years ago, they helped bring the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) to power, believing Narendra Modi’s claims that they would no longer suffer official neglect. But since then, conditions in agriculture have got worse. Earlier problems have worsened as farm incomes have been squeezed...

-The Hindu Rather than just increased budgetary outlays, farmers need plans that will rescue them from crop failure Similar to the last two Budgets, this year’s pro-agriculture intentions are palpable through increased outlays to the agricultural sector and initiation of various programmes. They seem impressive, but closer scrutiny shows that the measures may be of little help to stem the tide of agrarian distress. There are some real challenges confronting three...