-The Telegraph New Delhi: The countrywide monsoon rainfall this season was three per cent below average instead of the predicted six per cent above average, but it was distributed well enough to promise good crop yields, scientists said. An end-of-season analysis by the India Meteorological Department (IMD) shows that the quantum of the all-India rainfall was about 97 per cent of the long-period average. It also reveals that 27 of the country’s 35...

-The Hindu Recent years have been a watershed in the public health programme in India. We have managed to eradicate diseases such as polio and tetanus, reduced maternal and child mortality rates significantly, halved the prevalence of tuberculosis and malaria and increased the life expectancy for both adults and children. These achievements reflect the unflinching efforts of the Indian government and all stakeholders in the past two decades to ensure health...

-Hindustan Times New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s pet Swachh Bharat initiative may be celebrating two years with much fanfare on Sunday but just a fifth of the respondents in a recent nationwide survey say local municipalities have improved garbage collection or cleanliness. The study found the hygiene has visibly improved in only four states – three of them ruled by the BJP while the rest of India reported marginal or no...

-The Hindu Kerala leads in household toilet coverage, three cities from Karnataka find place in the new list. Sikkim and Himachal Pradesh have the maximum percentage of villages that are ‘Open Defecation Free’ according to the criteria of the Swachh Bharat Mission. While the northeastern State scores a hundred per cent, as per the current tally, Himachal Pradesh scores 55.95 per cent. Other better performing States with village-level achievements are Haryana and Meghalaya with...

-The Hindu Pulls up AAP government for chikungunya deaths in capital. New Delhi: The AAP government on Friday blamed the spread of chikunguniya infection in the national capital on officers hesitant to work. In a hearing before a Supreme Court Bench led by Justice Madan B. Lokur, senior advocate Ajit Kumar Sinha, representing the Lieutenant-Governor’s office, pointed to a statement made by the Delhi government suggesting an atmosphere of confusion prevailing in the...