The government plans to set up 750 soil testing laboratories, static as well mobile, across the country by 2012 for improving soil health and productivity. Establishment of 500 new static soil testing laboratories (STLs) and 250 mobile ones has been envisaged under the scheme ‘National Project on Management of Soil Health and Fertility’ during the 11th Plan period. During 2008-09 there were 661 STLs in the country, minister of state for consumer...

Plagued by power shortage but determined to find a way out, 10 villages in Karnataka have switched to solar power. Kerosene lamps and ‘chullahs’ are now things of the past. Anitha Pailoor documents this journey from darkness to light.d to light It’s half past eight in a tiny village called Neeralakatti, 15 km from Dharwad where Mangala is sitting at home, busy grading farm-picked brinjals as she has to send...

Delhi has reconfirmed its position as the worst city in the country as far as women’s safety is concerned. Last year, with 452 rapes, it emerged as the most unsafe. With 178 rape cases, Mumbai had 278 fewer rapes than Delhi, but 112 more than neighbouring Pune’s 66 and a lot more than Kolkata’s 40 — something that’s come as a shocker for a city that prides itself in being...

The NAC's recommendations on food security measures take heed of the fact that PDS reform is dependent on the availability of enough foodgrains. Three major elements of the United Progressive Alliance government's commitment to provide food security to the people are reforming the public distribution system (PDS), raising foodgrain productivity and production, and creating a decentralised, modern warehousing system. Ideally, the reforms in the PDS should have come first for the availability...

Amipur may be a small dot along the national highway from Patna to Nawada, but its ambitions are big. In the 50-odd households in the village, sparsely populated and rife with an uneasy quiet, most men have left for work outside Bihar. Siyaram Chauhan is the one who returned. He was rescued last month by the state government officials from a brick kiln in Uttar Pradesh’s Bahraich where he worked as...