The budget has allocated of total Rs160,887 crore, or 36.4% Plan allocation, to the social sector. The Bharat Nirman group of welfare schemes has together been allocated Rs58,000 crore. The income of workers and helpers at anganwadis, or government-run day-care centres, has been doubled. The move is expected to benefit nearly 2.2 million people. However, it has not been replicated for voluntary accredited social health activists of the National Rural...

The budget is a “mixed bag” for the Sonia Gandhi-led National Advisory Council, said members. It promises to bring in the National Food Security bill that the Congress chief hopes will signpost UPA-II’s continuing commitment to social and economic inclusion in the way that the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act did UPA-I. But finance minister Pranab Mukherjee’s restatement of the Centre’s position on indexing MNREGA wages to the consumer price...

Altogether 40 lakh people were treated during the month-long health awareness CAMPAign throughout Bihar that concluded here on Sunday. State Health Minister Ashwani Chaube said this while releasing a report card of the initiate launched by the State Government last month to take medical facilities to the doorsteps of the people. The doctors also operated upon 22,000 patients and another 2200 people underwent eye operation, Mr. Chaube said. The health department organised medical...

Health authorities in India's Rajasthan state are investigating allegations that 13 pregnant women died after they were given infected intravenous (IV) fluids at a government hospital. All the deaths were reported in Jodhpur city over the past 10 days. Laboratory tests had confirmed that IV fluids supplied by a local company were "tainted", officials said. A police case has been registered and an investigation has begun, they said. "The women died after severe haemorrhaging...

Money makes news. When it is found, promiscuously. And when it is lost, presumptively. And when it is found to lie hidden. Also when it stands brazenly, as in election candidatures. Does hunger, to satisfy which money, income, wages — the power to purchase food — are needed, make news? Does the crisis in our agriculture make news? When Amartya Sen speaks of hunger and malnutrition, when MS Swaminathan does so...