KEY TRENDS   • During 2014-15, while procurement of foodgrains (rice and wheat) increased from 56.9 million tonnes to 60.2 million tonnes, offtake of foodgrains (rice and wheat) from the PDS decreased from 59.8 million tonnes to 55.9 million tonnes. Despite increased availability in the PDS and prevalence of high inflation in foodgrains, dependence on the PDS is reducing, suggesting that there may be issues of availability, timely availability and quality of the PDS foodgrains...

  Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)  In order to address the problems of poverty, inequality and climate change, world leaders gathered at the United Nations in New York on 25 September, 2015 to adopt the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. As per the United Nations Development Programme  India website (please click here to access), the 2030 Agenda that comprises 17  new Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), is expected to guide policy and funding for the next 15...

-The Hindu People coming from abroad have to undergo two different medical checks and are being stamped at the second screening point Delhi has begun stamping the forearms of people, who have been advised home quarantine in the wake of the coronavirus outbreak. In a crackdown on people who have been advised home quarantine but are found travelling/mingling in public, authorities have begun stamping the hands of people with an indelible ink similar...

-The Hindu India now accounts for highest number of increase in cases globally. The government’s focus should be to prevent deaths from COVID-19 and no longer on containing the infection, says a statement jointly issued by the Indian Public Health Association (IPHA), the Indian Association of Preventive and Social Medicine and the Indian Association of Epidemiologists. India now accounts for the highest number of increase in cases globally. Lockdowns have outlived their utility in...