-One World South Asia/ Women's Feature Service This is a success story. The backdrop: a small, dusty village in Madhya Pradesh; the protagonists: oppressed dalit women, who managed to shed their inhibitions and overcome centuries old caste and class baggage to save their children from the curse of hunger and severe malnutrition. Mundalana village in Sonkatch block of Dewas district is home to 800 dalits, out of a total population of 2,600. Owing...

-The Times of India RAJKOT: Gulab Singh Budhel, a tribal living in Amreli's Luvava village, and his seven family members packed their bags on Wednesday to leave for Kutch in search for construction labour work. With a spectre of drought looming large over Saurashtra and crops having failed already, Budhel has no choice but to leave. "Survival is becoming tougher as no farmer is lending us money because of delayed monsoon and...

-The Times of India CHENNAI: India has 43.5 lakh labourers in the age group of 5 to 14 years, according to the 2011 census. Uttar Pradesh has the maximum number of child workers with nearly 9 lakh and a majority of them are in the rural areas. This is followed by Maharashtra with close to 5 lakh. Compared to the 2001 census, there is a drop of 65% in the number of...

-Economic and Political Weekly     Sustained and focused efforts have to be made by the Tamil Nadu state government to provide relief and rehabilitation to the drought affected people of the state. S Rajendran (myrajendran@gmail.com) is with the Department of Economics, Periyar University, Salem, Tamil Nadu. Due to the failure of the north-east monsoon in December 2013, Tamil Nadu is witnessing drought like conditions this year, leading to poor agricultural productivity, rural distress,...

India has witnessed many fiery debates on poverty estimates. Equally contentious has been the issue of inequality. Now a new report on exclusion offers a fresh perspective on poverty, inequality and social justice. (See below a summary of the report) Based on data and knowledge resources available in the public domain, India Exclusion Report 2013-14 highlights the systematic discrimination faced by women, Scheduled Castes (SCs), Scheduled Tribes (STs), Muslims, persons with...