-The Indian Express The Indian Express travels across Jamui, Sheikhpura and Patna districts and tracks down nearly 600 entries shown as tested to find glaring gaps between what’s on paper — and what’s on the ground. Jamui, Patna and Sheikhpura: Over three days last month, three Primary Health Centres (PHC) in Bihar’s Jamui district tested 588 residents for Covid — all were negative. The name, age and cell number of each person...

-The Indian Express The application is the result of years of painstaking research and documentation by a diverse team of clinical doctors, scientists, photographers and wildlife enthusiasts settled in different corners of the globe on a purely voluntary basis. Kochi: Did you know that the Malabar Pit Viper, a venomous snake found in evergreen, semi-evergreen hill forests and plantations in Kerala, can appear in almost 15 different colour morphs — from greenish...

-The Indian Express A theme common to both mahapanchayats in Muzaffarnagar and Shamli, which saw communal violence in 2013, was an appeal to keep religious identities aside and come together as farmers. Muzaffarnagar, Shamli: From Greta Thunberg to sugarcane dues to communal harmony — a mahapanchayat in Shamli on Friday, meant to rally western UP support for the farm protests, saw speakers explain a host of issues to an estimated 10,000-strong crowd. The...

-IDROnline.org The story of a self-help group that boosted livelihoods and household incomes in Odisha, depicted through Madhubani art. In Koraput district, Odisha, lies a remote village called Kanjariguda, home to an Adivasi community of farmers who predominantly grow ragi and rice. The village is so remote that villagers have to walk several kilometres—across forests and mountains—to hull their rice or access basic services such as Mobile charging, photocopying, or printing. In 2019,...

In order to understand why the Union Budget 2021-22 is being termed as ‘transparent’, it has to be read simultaneously with the 15th Finance Commission Main Report for 2021-26. But first, let us discuss 'fertilizer subsidy'. The budget documents for Union Budget 2021-22 show that the spending on ‘fertilizer subsidy’ was slashed from Rs. 1,33,947 crore in 2020-21 (revised estimate) to Rs. 79,530 crore in 2021-22 (budget estimate). However, the budgetary...