Among the various definitions of "noise" is this one: "Something that draws public notice". And "Making Noise" is precisely what groups all over India are doing, or planning to do, in the days ahead in order to wake up the government to its promises. In the year 2000, India was among the countries that had signed on to achieve, by 2015, the United Nations Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). These goals...

Apni kheti, apna khaad / Apna beej, apna swaad (Our own farm, our own fertiliser / Our own seeds, our own taste) -- Prakash Singh Raghuvanshi. A farmer from Tandia village in Varanasi has a solution to India's burgeoning food crisis. In a land where poverty, hunger, malnutrition and farmer suicides are rampant, Prakash Singh Raghuvanshi's innovation could work wonders. He has single-handedly developed a number of high yielding, nutritious...

A common incidence of rotting food grains has been reported in India and the Philippines even as millions are starving. The problem has to be tackled with dexterity at both the domestic and regional levels to curb this alarming wastage of food that contributes to food insecurity at large. RECENT NEWS reports from the Philippines and India interestingly surfaced with one common problem -- rotting food grains in both countries, even...

Sharda, a 17-year-old mother, gave birth to her first child in February in a village in Noida, just a few hours' drive outside New Delhi. Though her son was born premature and weak, he received no treatment. In many parts of India, particularly in poor and marginalized communities, a woman is considered impure for a fortnight after giving birth. After labor, Sharda was relegated to a makeshift room outside her...

Atleast 35 people, mostly adults, have died of various infections, including swine flu, at Warud in Amravati district in a month, with seven deaths occurring in the past 24 hours. The town, which is famous for its orange cultivation, is around 100 km from Nagpur. Health officials blamed the high casualty number on a recent policy change. The government centralised purchase of medicines for public hospitals earlier this year citing corruption...