-Newsclick.in A plethora of evidence shows that in India, public-private partnerships have either been rolled back or have led to poor health outcomes. Recently, government think-tank NITI Aayog came up with a proposal for running district hospitals in public-private partnership (PPP) mode. Under the proposal, new and existing private medical colleges will be linked with functional district hospitals. According to sources, the proposal is open to public comments till February 10, 2020. There...

-The Indian Express “At a time when the economic situation in the country warrants the closest attention of the government, India can ill afford a situation where the citizenry and the government enter into confrontation on the roads,” said the letter. New Delhi: As many as 106 retired bureaucrats on Thursday issued an open letter, saying both NPR and NRC were “unnecessary and wasteful exercises” that will cause hardships to public. The...

-The Hindu While opening up the coal mining sector, the govt. must protect the interests of Coal India The Centre’s decision to liberalise norms for entry into coal mining and relax regulations on mining and selling coal in the country is significant in many respects. Amendments to two legacy Acts through the Mineral Laws (Amendment) Ordinance 2020 cleared by the Cabinet on Wednesday will free the sector from restrictions that were inhibiting...

-The Indian Express CAA and NRC introduce a meddlesome officialdom into a question as fundamental as citizenship. Why not open our doors to all who sign up in our national mission of being democratic, open, tolerant and inclusive? In 2014, then candidate Narendra Modi’s slogan of “maximum governance minimum government” had resonated with many voters who felt that the Indian government loomed too large in their lives while delivering too little to...

-The New Indian Express The Survey of India plans to use drones to create a high-resolution map of every inch of India. It comes with unprecedented privacy and security challenges The Survey of India (SoI) has embarked upon an ambitious project of using drone imaging to create an ultra-high resolution spatial and topographic map of India. Professor Ashutosh Sharma, Secretary, Department of Science and Technology, calls it the biggest endeavour in Indian...