-DNA In the midst of the euphoria in the capital markets, after a strong mandate for Narendra Modi, the loud cries of wailing farm widows have been lost in the noise and cacophony that followed. To my mind, this is the biggest policy paralysis that afflicts the country. So when I heard Modi speak at the Central Hall of Parliament the other day: "Ours will be a government that thinks, works and...
More »SEARCH RESULT
Heading towards a cliff -Kundan Pandey
-Down to Earth As India elects new government, the 12th Five Year Plan may no longer be pro-poor MUCH hope is pinned on the 12th Five Year Plan that was declared as the first health Plan by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. The United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government, while drafting the Plan, also termed it "pro-poor" and promised the maximum budget for social welfare schemes. But as the Plan comes into force this...
More »Forced labour 'making $150bn profit' - ILO report
-BBC Forced labour generates illegal Profits of at least $150bn (£90bn; 110bn euros) a year, a study by the International Labour Organization (ILO) says. The Profits are far higher than previous estimates and the ILO wants governments to tackle the problem. Some 21 million people worldwide are in forced labour, it says, with migrant workers most vulnerable. Over half of all forced labourers work in Asia, with 18% in Africa and almost 10% in...
More »Lucrative but ‘fundamentally evil,’ forced labour must be eradicated once and for all –UN agency
-The United Nations Millions of people suffering under the yoke of modern slavery - more than half are women and girls primarily in commercial sex trade or domestic work - are generating some $150 billion a year in illegal Profits for the people who are exploiting them, according to a new report released today by the United Nations International Labour Organization (ILO). The startling new report, Profits and Poverty: The Economics of Forced...
More »Saving for rainy days -Savvy Soumya Misra
-Down to Earth People of West Bengal's Sunderbans region are setting up grain banks to safeguard against food crisis Subedan Bibi's mud hut is a few metres from the banks of the Bakchara river, a distributary of the Hugli in Sunderbans region of South 24 Parganas. When the river is in spate she and most others of Goyadham village move to the main market in the nearby block. "Floods and storms destroy...
More »