-The Hindu   Almost five months since having declared that Lavasa's hill city project near Pune violated the Environment Protection Act, the Union Environment Ministry has finally told the Maharashtra government to take “necessary action” against the company. In a letter to the State government on Friday, the Ministry said Lavasa had started development and construction work on 681 hectares of land without obtaining the necessary prior environmental clearance. It asked the Maharashtra...

Women speak out fears of resisting deep-seated taboos associated with menstruation, viewed even today as polluting in much of India The status of women in India, despite all the brave talk, remains as precarious as ever. This is, after all, a culture which not just condones, but actively encourages the termination of foetuses determined to be female. Other crimes of violence against women are routine. Can things ever change? We took...

The impending BPL Census exercise will not help the poor; on the contrary, it will further deny them a fair share in national resources. The BPL, or Below Poverty Line, Census 2011 for the rural areas will start in select States this month. In a country such as India with vast numbers of the poor, counting the poor often becomes an exercise in undercounting and dividing them, to suit the wholly...

‘Till they stop murdering cows, corruption will not end,’ said Dolath Prachapati of Deshram Memorial Gau Seva Trust at Rajghat on Wednesday. While India Against Corruption and other social groups of the kind were an integral part of the mela, calling for the removal of corruption, a host of other groups descended on Rajghat with views of their own. Though united in a common grouse — the eviction of Baba Ramdev...

How effective are India's innumerable social security programmes at reaching out to the poorest of the poor? If a recent World Bank report is anything to go by, they are woefully inefficient. According to the report, titled "Social Protection for a Changing India", leakages and exclusion errors are endemic across the country. For instance, just 27% of the PDS . beenficiaries are the poorest of the poor. The World Bank found...