-Hindustan Times Hindus continue to have the lowest level of educational attainment among all the major religions of the world despite having made strides in the sector, a Pew study said on Wednesday. “Hindus have made substantial educational gains in recent decades. Hindu adults (ages 25 and older) in the youngest generation analysed in the study, for example, have an average of 3.4 more years of schooling than those in the oldest...

-Down to Earth FAO estimates that the world will need to produce some 60 per cent more food, on an average, to feed a hungry world by 2050 Governments, in conjunction with the private sector, need to tap agricultural science and technology research capacities to meet the zero hunger Challenge by 2030. This requires greater public expenditure and investment in science and technology, the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) says. Earlier, the...

-The Hindu On the tenth anniversary of the historic passage of the Forest Rights Act, tribal resistance to defend their rights is growing even as government after government tries to dilute its provisions On this day 10 years ago the historic Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act was passed in the Lok Sabha. Its conception and passage was the result of the decades of struggles and...

-Hindustan Times Plight of the migrants: Jobless labourers return home after demonetisation Twenty-three-year-old Avinash Kumar is planning to postpone his sister’s marriage. The money he had saved, working at a sweatshop in New Delhi’s Mongolpuri, is all but gone. Kumar lost his job in about two weeks from the time Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced a ban on Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes, in a move that he termed as the biggest-ever...

-The Indian Express With optic fibre cables laid in over 65,000 gram panchayats, Centre’s BharatNet project seems on track to achieve its 1,00,000 target by March 2017. However, lack of active connectivity remains a concern. Ahmedabad/ Gandhinagar/ New Delhi: With less than 25 per cent of the 65,475 gram panchayats in the country with optic fibre connectivity having active internet under the BharatNet project, the success of Centre’s push for digital payments...