-RuralIndiaOnline.org With no industrial activity and low wages in agriculture, men from Bhagabanpur in Maldah district go to work in faraway places like Uttarakhand and Himachal Pradesh, just to survive and send money home Rehna Bibi didn’t think much when her phone call to her husband, Anas Shaikh, failed to connect at 10.30 a.m.on February 7, 2021. They had spoken less than two hours ago. “His grandmother had died that morning,” says...

-Down to Earth Destruction of date palm trees during cyclone Amphan and warming weather have resulted in a huge decline in production of West Bengal’s trademark nolen gur It is safe to assume that anyone coming from Jaynagar would be carrying nolen gur (date palm jaggery), goes a proverb in West Bengal. The locality in South 24 Parganas district is known for its sweets since pre-Independence days. Jaynagar moa, a sweet made...

-Down to Earth The country reported 82,170 VIIRS alerts in the fortnight till April 14; Uttarakhand sees significant jump in number   India recorded 82,170 forest fire alerts from April 1-14, 2021 nearly double the number reported during the same period past year, according to Global Forest Watch (GFW), an open-source monitoring application. The country reported 43,031 alerts during the corresponding fortnight in 2020, according to GFW data using Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer...

-Hindustan Times There has Been limited assessment of the pandemic’s wider effects on the children of migrants. On Tuesday, the Supreme Court, in response to a petition filed by NGO Child Rights Trust, asked for data from all states and Union Territories on children of migrant workers. Nitin Kumar’s eyes were full of despair as he waited along with his parents for a bus to Hardoi at Anand Vihar bus station on...

-TheWire.in A three to six-month fiscal plan has to be chalked out to make vaccines and drugs available to people of all ages across the states by bringing in the private sector. An income support scheme has to be rolled out for nine months at least. India reported a new high of 2 lakh fresh coronavirus positive cases for the first time last week, and the last few days continue to see...