-The Week Shambhu Kumar, 8, quite liked his job as a domestic help in a small town in Assam. He had to mind two children nearly his age, keep an eye on the ducks and be available for chores all day. It wasn't too hard, and he was well fed, too, though he missed his grandmother, a tea garden labourer. One day, some women from the state education department came to the...
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Of Millstones, Milestones & Millionaires -P Sainath and Ananya Mukherjee
-GRIST Media If hard work and enterprise inevitably made you prosperous, every rural woman would be a millionaire. These women have borne the brunt of the radical, often brutal transformation of rural India these past two decades. Our writers examine the hardships they continue to face as well as their remarkable vision to solve some of the greatest problems of our times such as food security, environmental justice and developing a...
More »Where Do They Squat? -Santosh Mehrotra
-Outlook Build toilets. But more important, get communities to change ways. Vidya Balan, the Bollywood star and ambassador of the Indian government's programme for building household toilets, asks the mother-in-law who is busy toying with her bahu's ghunghat at the wedding ceremony: "Do you have a toilet at home for the daughter-in-law to use?" Mum-in-law replies: "No." Vidya then asks her, "Then why are you extending her ghunghat so much when you...
More »Banks Finally Give ‘Debt Relief’ to AP Government
-The New Indian Express HYDERABAD: In a much-awaited relief to the cash-starved Andhra Pradesh government, the State Level Bankers' Committee (SLBC) on Tuesday reportedly agreed to accept its offer of upfront payment of 20 per cent outstanding crop loans of eligible farmers. The SLBC has constituted a sub-committee to look into proposals made by the Andhra Pradesh government on the modalities of crop loan waiver scheme and after a thorough discussion, finally...
More »PM Modi orders Aadhaar cards for all by June 2015 -Ruhi Tewari
-The Indian Express Prime Minister Narendra Modi has directed the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) to ensure "universal coverage" under Aadhaar by June 2015. According to government officials, the PM set the deadline at a high-level meeting chaired by him in the first week of September. The target was reiterated in the minutes of the meeting circulated to all the concerned departments. Directions have also been issued to the Registrar General...
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