-The Indian Express As efforts are made to make India open defecation free by 2019, the biggest stumbling block is not the lack of enough toilets, but the difficulty in convincing people to start using them. New Delhi: Despite freshly-constructed functioning toilets in their homes, a group of old men in a village in Daniyawan block, about 30 km southeast of Patna city, continued to go out in the fields to defecate....

-The Hindu Business Line The unique needs of those who work in cities even as they maintain homes in the village must be addressed by policymakers   Cities bring with them a sense of permanence. Many of them have been around for hundreds of years. Some of their more memorable institutions too tend to have long histories. It is no surprise, then, that most of urban policy takes aspects of a city to...

-FirstPost.com Preparation of budgets is traditionally an incremental process: the first railway budget of the present government took off from the landscape sketched in the 12th Five Year Plan. Expansion, modernisation and development of Railway Infrastructure were to be given thrust through 3Ps: Public-Private Partnerships. Budget 2016-17, however, promises a new horizon on two fronts: overcoming challenges through 3Rs: Reorganising, Restructuring and Rejuvenating Indian railways, and introducing pillars of strategy, including zero-based...

-The Telegraph Nagpur: Delhi Metro architect E. Sreedharan has suggested that investments in upgrading existing railway systems should take priority over high-speed bullet trains the Centre aims to roll out, his comments coming days before the rail budget. "Eventually, we must go for bullet trains but this is not the right time to invest in that system," Sreedharan, referred to as the "Metro Man" for his role in building the network in...

-The India Express For the health, dignity and safety of women in slums, a comprehensive policy for the maintenance and construction of public toilets is needed. Living in a slum in Bandra West close to the railway station, Vijaya wakes up every morning to anxiety over the trek she and her daughter must take into the open, carrying water cans, to answer nature’s call. They could use the community toilet nearby, but...