-The Hindu The Modi government is determined to dismantle the two-pronged welfare paradigm. It is now an established fact that one area where the Narendra Modi administration has acted with a sense of purpose, urgency and resolve is in slashing social expenditure. Be it education, health, agriculture, livelihood security, food security, panchayati raj institutions, drinking water or the Scheduled Castes/Scheduled Tribes sub-plan, central government funds earmarked for social protection have been cut. The...

-The Hindu Without a head, functioning of Central Information Commission has come to a halt When the Bharatiya Janata Party won by a massive majority in the general election last year, one of the key election promises that brought it to power was transparency and accountability in governance. A year later, many of the electoral promises made on that front remain on paper — the Lokpal Bill and the Grievance Redressal Bill,...

-The Hindu India also scores poorly in the Mother’s Index Rank standing at 140 out of 179 countries. India is one of the 10 countries in the world with the greatest survival divide between Wealthy and poor urban children. It figures in this worrying list with other nations that include, Rwanda, Cambodia, Kenya, Vietnam, Peru, Madagascar, Ghana, Bangladesh and Nigeria. India has also scored poorly in the Mother’s Index Rank standing at 140...

-The Hindu A study shows that Indians are not immune to health consequences of smoking and that smokers have a higher death rate than non-smokers. Recently, a parliamentary committee declined to extend the size of health warnings on cigarette packets due to lack of independent evidence on the health impacts of smoking on the Indian population. A longitudinal study conducted by the National Council of Applied Economics (NCAER) and University of Maryland shows that in...

-The Hindu Not all the amendments to the Prevention of Corruption Act cleared by the Union Cabinet last week inspire public confidence or meet the objective of filling gaps in domestic anti-corruption law. In significant respects, the proposals fall short of public expectations and fail to address key issues in corruption jurisprudence. In its Bill introduced in the Rajya Sabha in 2013, the UPA government proposed to extend the protection of...