-Al Jazeera More than 100 workers have died of starvation since West Bengal's tea estates have begun shutting down. Jalpaiguri/Alipurduar, India - The picturesque tea gardens carpeting West Bengal's Dooars region are gradually turning into graveyards, as dozens of workers have fallen victim to starvation in recent months. More than 100 tea-garden workers have died of starvation in the past year amid site closures, activists say - but rather than taking action, the...

-Economic and Political Weekly The relationship between depleting water levels and school dropout rates is poorly studied. As chronic water shortages begin to affect more regions of the country, this trend will begin to appear more forcefully. Kishore Jha (kishor.delhi6@gmail.com) is working on child rights with Terre des Homes, Germany. Devender, a 14-year-old boy from Kheeda village in Almora district in Uttarakhand State, studies in Class 8. He spends at least three hours...

-Down to Earth Women of a Maharashtra hamlet give husbands an ultimatum-build toilets or go without food TOILETS ARE not an issue over which one sees agitations every day. And when it comes to women agitating against husbands, it may well be an unprecedented situation. Yet, the women of Amgaon, a tiny village in Wardha district of Maharashtra, did just that. On June 24, they staged a choolband, or no-cooking protest, forcing...

-The Business Standard A delayed monsoon has forced farmers in Western UP to use alternative sources of irrigation, incurring 25-30% extra costs Saharanpur/Muzaffarnagar (UP): If the latest inflation reading at eight per cent, largely fuelled by near double-digit food inflation, has left us worried, get ready to pay even more for food in coming months. Though the monsoon deficit has reduced to only 17 per cent, the rise in input cost...

-The Hindu Reason: inordinate delay in sanctioning of funds by Centre Theni (Tamil Nadu): Thousands of labourers, who registered their names with the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS), in rain-fed and drought-prone areas of the district are jobless due to the inordinate delay in sanctioning of funds by the Centre. The delay has not only stalled ongoing works but also affected implementation of new ones, according to officials in village...