-PTI A top UN official has condemned the murder of Indian journalist Chandrika Rai and asked the concerned authorities to conduct a thorough investigation to bring the perpetrators of the "shocking crime" to justice. Director-General of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO), Irina Bokova, said authorities in the Indian state of Madhya Pradesh, where Rai had lived and worked, must ensure the murder is investigated. "I condemn the murder...

India has just been taken off the World Health Organisation (WHO) list of polio-endemic countries. And if the success of not having a single new case over the past year is sustained for another two years, India will finally emerge as a polio-free country. The nation's public health administrators and international agencies deserve praise for this achievement. This is also perhaps just the right moment to recall the hands-on leadership role...

India has not reported a single polio case over the past one year, but Bihar has gone a step further by maintaining a clean slate for the past 16 months. The World Health Organisation (WHO) recently deleted India from the list of polio endemic countries, the first time that the country has been ticked out of the map. The last polio case in India was reported from Howrah district of Bengal on...

  MGNREGA, which entitles millions of workers enrolled under it to at least Rs 100 a day for 100 days of work in a year, is undergoing an overhaul based on a set of recommendations of a committee headed by the Planning Commission member Mihir Shah.   Encapsulated in The Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act 2005 - Operational Guidelines 2012 in what is being called “MGNREGA 2.0”, the recommendations aim for...

Days after Prime Minister Manmohan Singh spoke of the role of foreign-funded NGOs in instigating protests against genetic engineering in agriculture, Rural Development Minister Jairam Ramesh has asserted that his controversial decision to put the release of genetically-modified brinjal on indefinite hold in 2010 was not influenced by any NGO.   As the then environment minister, Jairam had blocked the commercial release of Bt brinjal, citing a lack of scientific consensus and...