-Press Release from National Alliance of People’s Movements (NAPM) Government Running away from Responsibility: Pushing Farmers on edges Overlooked the need of majority of population, catering to few Political ‘Jumlas’ continues, ditching farmers once again under the garb of corporate regime; reduced responsibilities of public sector In recent times, announcement of the Union budget seems to be becoming a futile exercise, even with all the publicity and hype associated with it. We...

-The Hindu Be it education, health, pensions for the socially vulnerable, distressed farmers, or MGNREGA, the 2016 Union Budget has nothing radical to offer. Appearances can be deceptive. Finance Minister Arun Jaitley’s emphasis on doubling farm incomes, rural development, and allocations for a battery of impressively named schemes for the social sector may give the impression that the right-wing NDA government has suddenly taken a ‘socialist’ turn. The reality, however, is otherwise. Howsoever...

-The Hindu The primary health-care system in India, intended to enable affordable health care, has not delivered on its promise. Rural, public health facilities are unable to attract, retain and ensure the regular presence of trained medical professionals. Health centres and hospitals in the public sector have proliferated but they are distributed inequitably. India may have one government hospital bed for every 1,833 people, but the reality is that while in...

Although there is sufficient data and evidence available in the public domain to argue whether there has been halving of poverty between 1990 and 2015, the same cannot be said with conviction about the halving of hunger—one of the targets set under the erstwhile Millennium Development Goals framework (replaced recently by SDGs). This is because the recently released data by the National Family Health Survey-4 (conducted in 2015-16) and the...

-The Hindu Bengaluru: With heightened concern over the impact of excessive use of technology — especially social media addiction — on mental health in our cities, the National Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences (NIMHANS) is planning to come up with an Urban Mental Health Plan. Revealing this at the 20th convocation of NIMHANS here on Saturday, institute Director B.N. Gangadhar said the current district mental health plan largely catered to issues...