Health care in India, at its finest, matches the standards of international best practice. The knowledge, skill and confidence of its doctors and nurses, the sophistication of available technology, quality of service and five-star hospitality compete with the best in the world. Its relatively low cost has made it an important player in the health tourism sector. However, at the other extreme, publicly funded health care services often do not...

82 children have died in Magadh division Bihar is in the grip of yet another lethal outbreak of viral encephalitis, which has claimed the lives of 82 children in the Magadh division so far. The latest death was reported on Sunday. The division's only government hospital, the Anugrah Narayan Magadh Medical College Hospital, has been swamped with 383 cases of encephalitis, with an average of six cases pouring in each day. This is...

L. Devasagayam moved into the tsunami resettlement quarters in the village of Idinthakarai on the coast in the far south of Tamil Nadu after his neighbourhood further south was destroyed in the 2004 calamity. But now, he worries that the colourful home that he gratefully accepted after that disaster could be his undoing. The reason for the fear confronts him when he steps out of his house. Clearly visible at a...

As a national debate rages over the Indian poverty line, in the heart of Bandra, one of Mumbai’s richest suburbs, in a shanty with barely enough standing space for two adults, three-year-old Priya Doiphode, clad in a red tee shirt, lies listless on a string bed. Priya is one of the 83,243 children in Mumbai who are malnourished, according to government data, a statistic that makes Mumbai the most malnourished...

Our country is poised at a dangerous place right now for many reasons. There are all kinds of battles for supremacy. There are real resistances, there are theatrical and false resistances, revolutions from the top, revolutions from the bottom. And sometimes all of this is interpreted by an increasingly hysterical media which doesn't allow space for reflection, for thought, that will only bombard, control the public imagination.   At times like this,...