-The Times of India NEW DELHI: A new study has found time spent on domestic chores can impact education. Data collected from 952 children and their communities in Andhra Pradesh and Telangana has shown that 12-year-olds who spend three hours or more on household chores in a day are 70% less likely to complete secondary education. These findings came to light after Renu Singh and Protap Mukherjee studied data gathered through the...

-The Hindu A student of Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU) suffering from severe cerebral palsy has become the only student with the severe disability to complete a Ph.D from the varsity. Akshansha Gupta, who hails from Jaunpur in Uttar Pradesh, is suffering from 95 percent disability but managed to complete his thesis on ‘Brain and Computer interface’. JNU Vice-Chancellor Sudhir Kumar Sopory awarded Mr. Gupta the Ph.D in a special ceremony. Cerebral Palsy affects...

-Livemint.com Sudha Bharadwaj fights for labour rights and is against land acquisition When Sudha Bharadwaj travels in Chhattisgarh, almost everyone recognizes her. She is what the locals would call a “woman of the people”. Bharadwaj, 54, is tall, with an unassuming demeanour. She has been living in the state for 29 years now, working as a trade unionist, a civil rights activist against land acquisition, and, more recently, as a lawyer. “If...

-PTI 'Pre-Exposure Prophylaxis' (PrEP), regular medicine would be given to HIV-negative sex workers who engage sexually with HIV-positive persons. Kolkata: One of Asia’s largest red light districts, Sonagachi will roll out an experimental project for providing HIV-preventive medicine to sex workers from next month. It will be the first such initiative in the country. The feasibility project recently received clearance from the National AIDS Control Organisation (NACO) and Union Health Ministry and is...

-Economic and Political Weekly The platform known as the JAM Trinity (an acronym for Jan Dhan Yojana, Aadhaar and mobile numbers) may enable a shift from the current Public Distribution System, based on price subsidies, to the direct transfer of benefits. However, it is incorrect to argue that JAM technologies will necessarily lead to the demise of the PDS. State-level experiences of computerisation, recounted here, reveal that the same technologies can...