-The Hindu Business Line/ NetworkIdeas.org With India experiencing a severe second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic, forcing decentralized lockdowns, a crisis of loss of jobs and livelihoods and resulting hunger is being reported from across the country. A reluctant central government has, therefore, been forced to revive the Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Anna Yojana (PMGKAY), to distribute 5 kilograms of free foodgrain per person per month to the approximately 80 crore...
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Aggressive vaccination key to combating COVID waves: doctors -Bindu Shajan Perappadan
-The Hindu Centre to make 6 crore doses available directly for priority groups in June An aggressive, liberalised vaccination program is key to preventing another surge of COVID-19, say health experts, warning that pandemics often persist for years presenting in-surges. “We have to accept that COVID is here to stay and that we have to work at long-term management of the virus,” say doctors. The warning comes even as India has so far managed...
More »Covid-19 and the disease of inequality -Yamini Aiyar
-Hindustan Times The second wave will deepen inequality. Expand support to states, universalise PDS, and ramp up MGNREGS now Abandoned by the State that insisted on locking down, refusing to recognise the damage done to their livelihoods, India’s workers asserted their rights and made themselves heard by walking home in March 2020. The long march home was emblematic of the suffering and hardship unleashed by the first wave. A year later, it is...
More »Work on database of migrant workers is slow, Supreme Court tells Centre -Krishnadas Rajagopal
-The Hindu Top court says provision of food for labourers need not wait until completion of registration The government’s delay in completing a national database to identify and register migrant workers across the country in order to provide them benefits in times of dire need stood out like a sore thumb in a Supreme Court hearing on Friday. A Bench of Justices Ashok Bhushan and M.R. Shah acknowledged submissions made by advocate Prashant...
More »Stop exporting our foodgrains; first ensure food security of the informal & migrant workers, urges Right to Food Campaign
-Press release by Right to Food Campaign Secretariat dated 23rd May 2021 Against the backdrop of rise in Covid-19 daily new deaths across the country and local level lockdowns being imposed by various State Governments, India is once again witnessing severe economic distress amongst its working class. The livelihood and food security crisis that is being faced by the poor, daily wage workers and the informal sector workers of the country...
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