-The Hindu Institutional deliveries are up in India, but breastfeeding within the first hour of birth needs to keep pace Despite institutional delivery being as high as nearly 79% nationally, the number of children in India breastfed within one hour of birth is less than 42% — near 43% in urban areas and 41% in rural India, according to the National Family Health Survey 4 (NFHS-4) Data released a few days ago....

-Hindustan Times India’s performance in the recently released Global Hunger Index (GHI) report is tragic. The country which is one of the largest producers of cereals, vegetables and fruits in the world, ranks 97 among 118 countries and is home to over 184 million undernourished people. India also pays a very heavy price for vitamin and mineral deficiencies, often called “hidden hunger”, as it loses $12 billion in gross domestic product...

-PTI NEW DELHI: The government's decision to make Aadhaar mandatory for subsidised foodgrains through public distribution system (PDS) today came under the scanner of the Delhi High Court. A bench of Chief Justice G Rohini and Justice Sangita Dhingra Sehgal issued notice to the Ministry of Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution and sought their response before the next date of hearing on April 24. The bench also sought the stand of the...

-Hindustan Times The last few weeks have seen a spate of government notifications making Aadhaar mandatory for receiving the benefits of government programmes. The most recent orders relate to an Aadhaar requirement for children to access schools (even under their fundamental right to education), mid-day meals, supplementary nutrition (ICDS) and scholarships. These directives raise a number of ethical as well as practical questions, besides violating children’s right to education, nutrition and...

-Livemint.com Aadhaar’s designers promised a robust privacy legislation, but the current government’s stance is that Indians have no fundamental right to privacy To govern India is to be constantly overwhelmed. So much needs to be done, and there’s so little to do it with. It’s hardly surprising that the Indian state is rarely ambitious. It seeks to manage, not to transform. One recent government initiative, less than a decade old, is by contrast...