-Down to Earth A high level UN panel on Access to Medicines wants members to make full use of TRIPS flexibilities to protect public health If ever India needed a clear endorsement of its laws on intellectual property rights (IPRs) and their application in meeting public health priorities, it has come from the highest quarters. The report of the UN Secretary General’s High Level Panel (HLP) on Access to Medicines has, directly...
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Poor forest rights act implementation hampers social justice to the tribals
Access to land and its resources is important since it determines the extent of poverty and deprivation one faces. Historically tribal populations and other traditional forest dwellers did not enjoy any legal entitlement such as ownership rights or user rights of the forest lands where they had been living since ages, both communally and individually. The Forest Rights Act (FRA) is, thus, seen as a progressive legislation that attempted to...
More »Rainfed farming: A watershed moment -Harish Damodaran
-The Indian Express A Pulses Revolution is possible even in the most backward districts, as a PPP project in Bundelkhand has shown. Damoh (Madhya Pradesh): Zahim Khan has two major worries, as he surveys the urad (black gram) crop on 14 out of the 20-acres land being jointly cultivated by him with 13 other farmers. The immediate concern is rains. Damoh district in Madhya Pradesh’s Bundelkhand region, of which his village Somkheda is...
More »Centre can’t shirk responsibility while dealing with drought: Supreme Court -Utkarsh Anand
-The Indian Express The bench also issued directives for updating the drought management manual - published in 2009 — after taking into account rainfall deficit, timely declaration of drought and other factors. New Delhi: RULING THAT “the buck will eventually stop with the Government of India”, the Supreme Court Wednesday directed the Centre to consider drought as a disaster and constitute a national response force along with a consolidated fund within...
More »Aadhaar project: Last chance for a welfare state -Arghya Sengupta
-The Indian Express That’s what the Aadhaar Act is. It was rightly categorised as a money bill and is wrongly expected to double up as a privacy statute With the billionth Aadhaar number being issued, the Aadhaar project is well on its way to becoming the centrepiece for governance in India irrespective of which government is in power. To that extent, critical engagement with the Aadhaar act is an essential exercise...
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