A lot has been said and written about the visit of Barack Obama, the President of USA to India. The corporate media was in the usual over-enthusiastic drive to bring to its readers and viewers all minute details about his visit from where he stayed and what he ate to how many warships, planes and cars accompanied him and how a whopping $200 million was spent per day for the...

With decline in insurgency, infrastructural development is taking place once again in Nagaland, especially in its rural areas. The change can be witnessed, particularly in villages where government-sponsored schemes are being implemented. Nagaland's Seithekema village is one such example. Located 20 kilometres from Dimapur on the National Highway-39, it exists as a hamlet. Established in 1979, it is located along the Valley of Parkai Mountain Range and inhabited by Angami tribals. The people here...

KEY TRENDS   • Section 105 of the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in the Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act, 2013, which provides for excluding 13 Central legislation, including Land Acquisition (Mines) Act 1885, Atomic Energy Act, 1962, Railway Act 1989, National Highways Act 1956 and Metro Railways (Construction of Works) Act, 1978, from its purview, has been amended for payment of compensation with rigours $ • The amendments have now...

KEY TRENDS   • Maternal Mortality Ratio for India was 370 in 2000, 286 in 2005, 210 in 2010, 158 in 2015 and 145 in 2017. Therefore, the MMRatio for the country decreased by almost 61 percent between 2000 and 2017 *14    • As per the NSS 71st round, among rural females aged 5-29 years, the main reasons for dropping out/ discontinuance were: engagement in domestic activities, not interested in education, financial constraints and marriage. Among rural males aged...

FEW rural pleasures match seeing a golden field of grain, rustling and ripe for reaping. But the harvest season in the northern hemisphere is being marked by turmoil on global wheat markets. A big reason is to be found in one of the world’s largest wheat exporters, Russia. Hit by fires and drought which have wiped out a third of the grain crop, the authorities there have banned exports, first temporarily...