Recent directions of the Delhi High Court to improve conditions for homeless people housed in Delhi’s night shelters need to be widely welcomed. At the same time, it should be realised that the problems of the nearly four-million homeless deserve wider and more regular attention as the lack of basic facilities for them at a national level is simply too glaring. Pucca and permanent shelters which can be used throughout...

Post-independence policies have taken away all securities of the small farmer Historically, compared to other developing economies, India has had relatively smaller agricultural land-holdings. Mixed farming and animal tending was the backbone of small and marginal rain-fed agriculture. Diverse food crops along with animal produce ensured relatively balanced nutrition. But policies in independent India reduced diversity while increasing the market dependence of small farms. Small farmers became victims of policies favouring...

Analysts have documented in some detail the constraints facing the government: the countryside is vast; the forests help protect the militants; the adivasi population in particular supports them; the hit-and-run tactics of the Maoists keep the security forces off balance; the increasing unification of the various factions makes the movement formidable and not easy to divide and conquer; its access to money and guns is growing as is its political...

The state government is contemplating building multiplexes in some selected gram panchayats to make urban entertainment available to the rural populace. Provisions starting from video parlours to indoor games, community halls and auditoriums will be available in these rural multiplexes. Besides, there will be at least 40 shops in each of the rural multiplex, which will be built on public-private partnership (PPP) mode. The proposal was discussed at a meeting chaired by...

The aftershock of the global financial crisis threatens to deprive millions of children in the world’s poorest countries of an education, the 2010 Education for All Global Monitoring Report warns. With 72 million children still out of school, a combination of slower economic growth, rising poverty and budget pressures could erode the gains of the past decade. “While rich countries nurture their economic recovery, many poor countries face the imminent prospect...