-The Hindu The Modi government is determined to dismantle the two-pronged welfare paradigm. It is now an established fact that one area where the Narendra Modi administration has acted with a sense of purpose, urgency and resolve is in slashing social expenditure. Be it education, health, agriculture, livelihood security, food security, panchayati raj institutions, drinking water or the Scheduled Castes/Scheduled Tribes sub-plan, central government funds earmarked for social protection have been cut. The...

-Press Information Bureau/ Cabinet The Union Cabinet chaired by the Prime Minister, Shri Narendra Modi, today gave its approval to a comprehensive New Urea Policy 2015 for the next four financial years. The Policy has multiple objectives of maximizing indigenous urea production and promoting energy efficiency in urea units to reduce the subsidy burden on the Government. Savings in energy shall reduce the carbon-footprint and would thus be more environment friendly....

Due to the annual decline in under-5 mortality rate by almost 7% during 2008-13, the Government is hopeful of India attaining the target 5 of Millennium Development Goal-4 i.e. reduce by two-thirds, between 1990 and 2015, the U5MR. This has been revealed in a press release on checking child mortality rate by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, dated 28 April, 2015.   However, experts think that this will be...

-PTI India, along with three neighbouring countries is among worst offenders in protecting journalists according to IFJ reports. India along with Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Afghanistan is among the “worst offenders” in the region in protecting journalists in 2014-15, International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) said in its latest report. The report ‘The Freedom Frontier- Press Freedom in South Asia’, which was released here today, advocated a strong need for a campaign to end...

-The Hindu This is the fourth time the U.S. government is taking up the issue of strictures against NGOs in the past couple of weeks. Accusing the government’s actions to regulate Non-Governmental Organisations including the Ford Foundation and Greenpeace International of having a “chilling effect” on civil society, U.S. Ambassador to India Richard Verma, said that India and the U.S. must find an understanding over the issue. “I read with some concern...