-Press Information Bureau (Ministry of Health and Family Welfare) As per the Sample Registration System (SRS), Registrar General of India (RGI-SRS), Maternal Mortality Ratio (MMR) has shown a decline from 212 per 100,000 live births in the period 2007-09 to 178 per 100,000 live births in the period 2010- 12 and Infant Mortality Rate (IMR) has declined from 47 per 1000 live births in the year 2010 to 42 per 1000...

-The Indian Express For several decades now, the Indian government and a variety of donor agencies have promoted and implemented "livelihoods projects". These projects depend upon women's self-help groups, or SHGs, to raise living standards - particularly of the 25 crore rural poor. In 2011, the Indian government launched the Rs 38,000 crore National Rural Livelihoods Mission (NRLM), also known as Ajeevika (reportedly now being merged with the Mahatma Gandhi National...

-Newsclick.in Caste discrimination percolates down to the food plates for Musahar community in Madhepura district of Bihar reports Neha Dixit "The mahant of the Shankar Math told me to stay away from ultra-Left people the day I questioned the Collector about the hunger deaths in my village," recounts Prabhansh Manjhi. Prabhansh is from the Musahaar community in Madhepura district of Bihar. Estimated to be 2.3 million in the country, they are Mahadalits, one...

-The Hindu Geeta Dharmarajan, founder of Katha, which has just completed 25 years of reaching out to the unreached in the National Capital. Scrolling down the students' blog of Katha, the non-profit organisation in the National Capital which runs schools for underprivileged children living in 248 slums, I come across a complaint letter by a child addressed to the Chairman, Municipal Corporation of Delhi. The child wants to bring to his notice...

-PTI AGARTALA: India's northeastern state of Tripura achieved the first position in literacy with 94.65 per cent, beating Kerala (93.91 per cent), Tripura chief minister Manik Sarkar announced here on Sunday. "Tripura jumped to first position among the states of the country in literacy from the 12th position in the 2001 census and the fourth position in the 2011 census," Sarkar said at a function on the occasion of International Literacy Day. Sarkar...