Even as the Right to Education Act comes into force in the country yesterday, the Mid-day meal scheme, an ambitious scheme of the previous Congress-led regime under PV Narsimha Rao, has failed to attract children to government schools in the state. Recently Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot admitted that 10 lakh children had dropped out of government schools in the state in the last five years. Official figures from the Rural...

Even as acrimony continues to haunt the status of the Women's Reservation Bill, the Petroleum Ministry has gone ahead with its own scheme of things to “empower” rural Indian women making it mandatory for 50 per cent ownership by women of cooking gas dealerships under the Rajiv Gandhi Gramin LPG Vitrak Yojana. The government is also considering sops to the Below Poverty Line population to encourage it to use the eco-friendly...

Spiralling prices of pulses have shown India’s dependence on imports. Pulses are integral to India’s diet but not its food policy. As a result, supply cannot meet demand. What are the consequences and solutions? Surendra Nath has switched to eating grass-pea, though he knows it is not good for health. But so is tobacco, he argues. He cannot do without pulses and pigeon-pea selling at Rs 100 a kg is beyond...

A recent survey carried out by the TNUEF brings to light details of the discrimination Dalits in Madurai have faced for generations. OVER seven decades have rolled by since the freedom fighter A. Vaidhyanatha Iyer successfully led Dalits into the Meenakshi temple in Madurai, overcoming all the impediments posed by the casteist forces that were hell-bent on thwarting the historic event. But the stark reality is that “hidden apartheid” against...

After easing a bit in the previous week, food inflation was back to near-20% levels in the third week of December as items such as potatoes and pulses continued to belie hopes of sustained relief over prices of essential commodities. The wholesale price-based index of food articles rose by 1.18% for the week ended December 19 from 18.65% a week ago. One week before that, food inflation had stood at...