-The Economic Times NEW DELHI: The government, in a bind over a recent Supreme Court order asking it to desist from linking social welfare schemes with its ambitious unique identity card Aadhaar, on Monday held out an assurance to the top court that no one would be deprived of any social welfare benefits for not holding Aadhaar. The government said while it had initiated the scheme to provide benefit transfers using Aadhaar...

-The Hindustan Times In many ways, they are the nowhere people. Now a Unesco report Social Inclusion of Internal Migrants in India puts the number of internal migrants at around a third of the population. This number is far higher than the number of migrants who leave India to work abroad. Yet, since most internal migrants move back and forth according to where they can find work, they get left out...

-Newsclick.in Recent studies have shown that even as India fares better than many developing regions of the world on several indicators of growth and development such as GDP, per capita, Purchasing Power Parity (PPP), literacy, life expectancy, etc., the number of malnourished children in India is significantly high. What explains this paradox? The Union Cabinet recently approved a multi-sectoral nutritional programme proposed by the Ministry of women and Child Development to reduce...

-Rediff.com Fairs are commonplace in the festive season but in tribal West Midnapore, which falls in the erstwhile Maoist-hit Jangalmahal area, it is child marriage fairs which are drawing large crowds. Such tribal child marriage fairs are held each year during this festive season. With the decline in Maoist violence, more tribals are fearlessly participating in the fairs being held this year, according to a report by women rights Non-Governmental Organisation 'Suchetna',...

-PTI NEW DELHI: Internal migrants, estimated to constitute about 30 per cent of the population, contribute 10 per cent to the country's GDP with employment having become the biggest reason behind migration, a UNESCO report has said. The report considers internal migration as being a key factor behind prosperous cities, boosting economic activity and growth. Citing various sources, it estimated that following Census 2011, the number of migrants may have increased to about...