-The Hindu India has a lasting infrastructure of public support that can, in principle, be expanded in drought years to provide relief. But business as usual seems to be the motto Droughts in India used to be times of frantic relief activity. Large-scale public works were organised, often employing more than 1,00,000 Workers in a single district. Food distribution was arranged for destitute persons who were unable to work. Arrangements were also...

-TheWire.in According to the central government’s statement to the Supreme Court last week, a third of the India’s districts are currently facing a severe drought. This means that at least 33 crore Indians are affected by ongoing the crisis. Expressing their deep concern on the issue and the impact it is having on rural populations of the country, and asking that the government take appropriate relief measures immediately, more than 150 academics...

Although the focus of erstwhile UPA and the present NDA government has been to achieve higher economic growth by reaping the 'demographic dividend', a recent report from the Central Statistics Office (CSO) informs us that a substantial chunk of the population underwent ageing during the last 60 years. The report entitled Elderly in India: Profile and Programmes 2016 from CSO (that comes under the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation) shows...

-CivilSocietyOnline.com Bhubaneswar: Basanti Bhoi cultivates two gardens of betel leaves all by herself at Dhanahara village  in Odisha. A year or two ago, a woman farming betel leaves would have been unthinkable. An age-old tradition barred women from entering betel enclosures. But today women in the district can grow betel leaves and work as labour in a betel garden. It is a social revolution brought about by Radio Kisan, a community radio...

-The Hindu Surveys conducted by activists estimate that there are over 1.2 million manual scavengers in India As numbers become data and move from being just a random rearrangement of 0-9, they speak volumes about peoples, nations, and their objectives. They form the basis of government policies, and have the intrinsic potential to change lives, correct historical wrongs and national trajectories. The last election results, we were told, were a message from ‘Aspirational...