-The Times of India Divorce, "illegitimate pregnancy" and professional/ career problems seem to be pushing more people to commit suicide. According to the NCRB report, in 2011, at least 16 people committed suicide every hour and the total figure was 1.35 lakh. While family problems accounted for almost one-fourth of suicides, illness was another major reason. Interestingly, suicides due to divorce and "illegitimate pregnancy" saw a rise of 54% and 20%...

-The Times of India UPA's flagship rural guarantee scheme is performing fitfully in terms of work days, wages and coverage, amply confirming rural development minister Jairam Ramesh's fears that the programme has become a scheme for digging ditches. The Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee, UPA's outreach to the poor, is not meeting critical parameters and is crying out for reform with questions about the utility a Rs 36,000-crore a year budget...

-The Economic Times A record high of 31% of Indian adults - or about 240 million Indians - rate their lives poorly enough to be considered 'suffering', according to the 2012 Gallup research released Monday at the Behavioral Economics Forum in New Delhi. This is against 24% "suffering" in 2011. Engagement in Indian workplaces is also a concern, with 8% of Indians who are employed for an employer being engaged, versus 32%...

What better elixir than pure water? Thanks to Naandi, a safe drinking water programme, 3,90,536 households in rural areas across four Indian states are benefited.  Naandi, headquartered in Hyderabad, is a not-for-profit organization which works with governing bodies in rural areas, including Karnataka, to provide clean drinking water to the poor. So what really is their modus operandi? It is essentially a community-run programme where the local governing body or gram...

The Sonia-Gandhi led National Advisory Council is pushing to amend the Unorganised Workers’ Social Security Act, 2008 to make it more inclusive and include a comprehensive social security package. The council, which met last month, pitched for a security package that would contain health insurance, maternity assistance, a life-cum-disability insurance scheme and a pension plan that it proposed should be provided through a single window backed by an inter-ministerial committee consisting...