-The Financial Express World Bank's latest data suggests realisation of millenium development goals may not be far off. Reduction of poverty and hence, how it is measured, has long been a contentious political economy issue in India. There is general discomfort every time the headcount ratio of the number of poor, based upon an accepted methodology recommended by an expert committee, declines; this then triggers a process to revisit known issues by...

-Economic and Political Weekly   The emphasis on use of digital technologies to bridge the "rural-urban gap" in the union budget is limited to high talk and minimal allocations. The need for a more comprehensive and peoples' participation-oriented rural action plan should have been the focus while setting sectoral allocations, but that is not to be in this mid-year budget. Vipul Mudgal (vipulmudgal@gmail.com) heads the Inclusive Media for Change project at the Centre...

-The Hindu   An improvement in sanitation and cleanliness will eliminate much of the difference in malnutrition between India and the rest of the world, and across Indian States Historically the greatest advances in longevity and mortality reduction have come not from treatment of individual disease but from public health. This includes modern drainage and sewerage systems (sewage treatment plants), drinking water systems that produce and deliver disease-free water and solid waste disposal...

-Economic and Political Weekly The processes of economic restructuring during the last two decades have witnessed a massive spurt of opportunities in the labour market which have, withholding the periodic shifts, facilitated women's workforce participation. Although the relationship between economic restructuring and occupational/ industrial diversities is fraught with ambiguities, it may generally be hypothesised that such enhanced openings would contribute towards the reduction in the often observed gendered segregation of labour...

-Down to Earth Five out of 20 world's most water-stressed cities are in India, says study Months after being named the city with world's most polluted air, here comes another blow for Delhi. A study, carried out by non-profit The Nature Conservancy, says that India's capital city is world's second most water-stressed city, just behind Tokyo. The study was carried out after surveying the water infrastructure of world's 500 cities with population of...