-The Indian Express Pune: Indians are living longer lives than earlier, but illness, disability and relatively early death remain severe healthcare challenges. And India appears to be lagging behind many of its neighbours including China on both life expectancy and death rates, according to the findings of a study that used new online tools announced by the Bill Gates and the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation. On December 15, The Lancet...

-First Post The national secretary of the All India Progressive Women’s Association (AIPWA), Kavita Krishnan, who was among the leading voices in the public protests that erupted following the gang-rape of 23-year-old student in Delhi has questioned the authority of the US Government in handing out international awards to women fighting against sexual violence. Krishnan’s reaction is in response to the US government’s announcement on March 4, naming the Delhi gang-rape victim...

-The Times of India CHENNAI: At least 100 sex workers who died more than two years ago continued to be listed by non-governmental organizations as beneficiaries of Tamil Nadu government's AIDS control programmes. A report compiled by Tamil Nadu State AIDS Control Society (Tansacs) in November 2012 showed that several NGOs working with high-risk populations were fudging documents and names. Many sex workers were on the list for more than 15 years,...

-The Times of India BHUBANESWAR: The Odisha governmentresumed land acquisition for the proposed Poscosteel plant in Jagatsinghpur district on Sunday, a day after three people were killed in a bomb blast in the project area. Official sources said government representatives demolished three betel vines at Gobindapur village, restarting land takeover after about a month. The work was done amid the deployment of about a dozen platoons of security personnel. Jagatsinghpur collector...

-Economic and Political Weekly Before I take issue with some of the points made in the NIPFP response to this comment, it may be useful to recapitulate a few points on which there appears to be agreement: (1) Aadhaar-integration can resolve only certain types of leakages, for which reliable data is unavailable; this was not adequately accounted for in the cost-benefit exercise; (2) the NIPFP study has a fragile basis (in...