-The Hindu A young girl in Jharkhand committed suicide because her father refused to build a toilet for her. When will the Indian male’s insensitivity to women’s basic needs change? Indian men urgently need basic ethical education. Since the 19th century, women’s education has been a progressive obsession with enlightened Indian social reformers. Although much remains to be done to get anywhere close to equal access to education for the genders, there...

-NDTV New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi's pet project, the Swachh Bharat Abhiyaan, has cost thrown up an ad bill of nearly Rs. 100 crore, according to information revealed through a Right to Information or RTI application.   The government has spent 94 crore only on print, radio and television ads to promote the cleanliness mission that PM Modi launched on Mahatma Gandhi's birth anniversary October 2 last year. The BJP-led government's bill matches...

-Hindustan Times New Delhi: Taking note of the issues raised in HT’s Sick Hospitals investigation, Delhi health minister Satyendar Jain on Friday promised to bring primary healthcare to the doorstep of every Delhiite with neighbourhood clinics, diagnostic labs and free ambulance services. “Currently, Delhi hospitals score two on (a scale of) 10,” admitted Jain. “Give me two years. They will at least score a six on 10. HT should do a follow-up...

-The Hindu Urban planning that involves the people and alternative service providers gives far better results than top-down efforts from the government, finds an IIT-M study In Tiruchirappalli, Tamil Nadu, the responsibility of managing and maintaining a set of more than 160 community toilets was handed over by the Tiruchirapalli City Corporation to a federation of women self-help groups. A post-programme field survey of 803 households revealed that the community participation had...

-Financial Express The countrywide roll-out of the much-touted National Food Security Act (NFSA) seems unlikely even this fiscal, with a clutch of major states including Uttar Pradesh, Tamil Nadu and Gujarat seeking more time to finalise and digitise the beneficiary lists and complete end-to-end computerisation of the public distribution system (PDS). The countrywide roll-out of the much-touted National Food Security Act (NFSA) seems unlikely even this fiscal, with a clutch of major...