Directs Centre to frame rehabilitation scheme for rescued children ‘Issue suitable notifications within two months to prohibit employment of children in circuses' Instances of children being forcefully detained, sometimes under extreme inhuman conditions The Supreme Court on Monday banned the employment of children in circuses and directed the Union government to take immediate steps to rescue those engaged in such employment. A Bench of Justices Dalveer Bhandari and A.K. Patnaik, passing orders on a...

It's that time of the year when Jharkhand celebrates the Sarhul festival. As saal trees sprout new leaves and blossom in leafless forests, tribals troop to the village 'saran sthal' (place to pray) to worship nature. White and red striped flags flutter along a cratered road snaking through Latehar's hilly terrain, from Rajdanda to Barahi. Construction of this road in Latehar's Mahuadanr block, around 120km from Ranchi, began last year. After...

60 % living alone or in nuclear families 85.9 % unaware of their human rights Every sixth old person living in urban areas in the country does not get proper food, every third old person does not get proper medicine or health care in old age and every second old person does not receive due respect or good treatment from family member or society. These are among the findings of a study on...

Cash transfer as substitute for state service provision is a dangerous recipe for callously anti-poor and corrupt governance. THE staggering number of recent articles, papers and books on the virtues of giving cash in place of public services to the poor has created an impression that a sort of epidemic has broken out. Economists, policymakers, bureaucrats and newspaper commentators are all infected by it and are in turn infecting others. The central...

Small-scale farmers can double food production within 10 years in critical regions by using ecological methods, a new UN report* shows. Based on an extensive review of the recent scientific literature, the study calls for a fundamental shift towards agroecology as a way to boost food production and improve the situation of the poorest. “To feed 9 billion people in 2050, we urgently need to adopt the most efficient farming techniques...