-Newsclick.in With sixty percent children malnourished in the state, the implementation of the Integrated Child Development Services, the largest scheme to provide nutrition to children in the country, is nothing but a sham. Sitting outside her semi-pucca house in Bilgram block, Kasturi says, "My children get five fistful of panjiri once a month from the Aanganwadi Centre." Thirty-three year-old Kasturi has never, in her parents' village or her in-law's village seen an...

-The Hindu Indentured labour may be a forgotten part of our colonial economic history but Bihar and eastern Uttar Pradesh are still sending ‘Girmitya' to toil in distant lands The descendants of indentured labourers, who migrated from eastern Uttar Pradesh and Bihar to erstwhile colonies, recently met at The Hague in the Netherlands to commemorate 140 years of migration - perpetuated through a system popularly known as ‘Girmit.' They gathered from all...

-The Hindu     Unorthodox models of conservation are needed to save this elusive and magnificent big bird "Have you seen the Big Five?" That's the question you will invariably be asked if you visit the East African states. The Big Five, Africa's largest, and thus most prominent, mammals - the lion, the rhino, the leopard, the buffalo and the elephant - have dominated camp fire stories, tourist expectations and the growth of conservation. Across...

-The Hindu   An open letter from Madhav Gadgil says Kasturirangan panel report will rob the region of its biodiversity Dear Dr. K. Kasturirangan, J.B.S. Haldane, the celebrated 19th-century scientist and humanist who quit England protesting its imperialistic invasion of Suez to become an Indian citizen, once said: "Reality is not only stranger than we suppose, but stranger than we CAN suppose!" I could never have imagined that you would be party to a...

-The United Nations Many chemicals found in household and industrial products that have not been adequately tested could have disrupting effects on the hormone system and lead to significant health issues, according to a United Nations report released today. The report highlights some associations between exposure to endocrine disrupting chemicals (EDCs) and health problems such as breast cancer in women, prostate cancer, attention deficit and hyperactivity in children and thyroid cancer. “Chemical products...