Every afternoon at about four, a slight woman named Runi slips out of the cramped, airless room that she shares with her husband and their sixteen children. She skirts the drainage ditch in front of the building, then walks toward the pile of hardened dung cakes that people in this slum on the edge of the northeastern Indian city of Patna use for fuel. Dressed in a bright-yellow sari shot...

Even as recent media reports caution that most fruits and vegetables are largely unfit for human consumption due to their high chemical content, pesticides continue to be used recklessly in the fields of Punjab. The ‘Granary of India’ constitutes 2.5 per cent of the total agricultural land in India, but consumes more than 18 per cent of the total pesticides used in India. Within the state the worst affected is the southwestern...

By spending just Rs 6,000 crore, the government can make a huge dent in the treatment of all sick people across the whole country — currently, people are spending as much as Rs 25,000 crore on buying essential medicines. This was the strong message sent out from a National Consultation organized by several civil society groups at New Delhi on Tuesday. Officials of the health ministry and the Planning Commission...

India has played a crucial role in making essential medicines available and affordable for patients in the developing world through generic drugs. This has been possible by linking India’s patent policies and laws to public interest. Similarly, policies that align public funded R&D in India with public health have the potential to provide incentives to the development of medical technologies (vaccines, diagnostics and medicines) crucial for treating neglected diseases like...

Union Minister of State for Environment and Forest Jairam Ramesh on Sunday said a nation-wide Comprehensive Environmental Assessment found that 88 industrial clusters were critically polluted. Out of these 88 clusters, 8 are in Maharashtra including Tarapur and Chembur. The environment Ministry will not give clearance to any industry in these 88 clusters unless Action Plan is prepared and implemented to improve the environment in these areas, said Mr. Ramesh,...