-The Indian Express   Niti Aayog proposal for privatising public hospitals is ill-designed, driven by ideology more than welfare The corporate hospitals have been resting their gaze on public hospitals for long: Land, doctors and patients. Finally, in the Niti Aayog, they have found a sympathetic collaborator. As per media reports, the Aayog is all set to push states to privatise well functioning district hospitals in the Tier 2 and 3...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: Several social sector schemes, such as MGNREGA, housing, irrigation, education and connectivity, are expected to see a significant increase over the next two financial years as the government ramps up spending in key areas ahead of the 2019 elections. According to the medium-term expenditure framework statement tabled in Parliament by finance minister Arun Jaitley on Thursday, the Centre's total spending is set to reach Rs 26...

-The Hindu A new regulatory regime for groundwater, that provides for equitable use, is urgently needed The water crisis India faces is of such a magnitude that urgent measures are necessary to address it. Yet, while the crisis is often discussed, law and policy measures to address it remain insufficient. This is partly due to the fact that the primary source of domestic water and irrigation is groundwater but the media and...

-The Hindu Why did the West Bengal girls’ welfare scheme win the UN Public Service Award this year? In 2014, Rehana (name changed), a 15-year old from a school in West Bengal’s Sunderbans region, was rescued from a red light area in Delhi. The Class IX student had been ensnared by traffickers who then sold her off in Kolkata. After being brought back, the local administration and a non-governmental organisation (NGO) re-enrolled...

-The Indian Express Agriculture education is in a poor state. ICAR must be revamped Although autarky on Indian farms is a distant dream, as the 71st year of Independence dawns, penury-ridden farmers are still committing suicide by the thousands— a consequence of decades of short-sightedness, while economists and scientists are still equating food sufficiency to farmer sustainability. The occasion merits introspection on the core issues of farmers’ distress. We must begin at the...