-The Indian Express New Delhi: The rule that makes helmets optional for women on two-wheelers, to "respect religious sentiments" of a few, appears to be having a drastic effect on fatalities in accidents. According to recent figures released by the Delhi traffic police, the number of women who died as they didn't wear helmets has gone up to 63 in 2013, against 42 in 2012. Of the 63 who died, only six...

-The Hindu The chopping off of the palms of two migrant workers is a wake-up call The gruesome incident of the chopping off of the palms of two migrant labourers of Kalahandi district of western Odisha by the labour contractor mafia in December 2013 should serve as a wake-up call. The incident highlights the ruthless extent to which the mafia can go to meet its ends and brings home the fact that...

-The Telegraph New Delhi: Public buses in 32 cities will have GPS facilities and video recorders under a proposal approved by the cabinet today as part of the Nirbhaya Fund for women's safety. The clearance of the road transport ministry's proposal comes over a year after the December 16, 2012, gang rape of a paramedic student in a Delhi bus and death weeks later. The Justice J.S Verma Committee, formed after the atrocity...

-The Hindu     Camp after camp has been forced to disappear in Muzaffarnagar by the official authorities. The people displaced by the communal riots are now in small shanty settlements, 10 tents here, another 10 tents half a kilometre down the road On December 26, 2013, a large group of visitors entered the Loi relief camp in Muzaffarnagar district, Uttar Pradesh. Loi camp - a festering sea of displaced and despairing humanity, with...

-Survival International Anthropologist Dr. Felix Padel works with the tribes of Odisha in eastern India, including the Dongria Kondh, for whom Survival International has campaigned for 10 years. Felix is the great great grandson of Charles Darwin and lives in a remote village in Odisha. In this interview, he talks to Survival about the Dongria Kondh's relationship to their mountains, their heroic struggle against Vedanta, Darwin's evolution theory and the experience...