-The Times of India   One month after the horrific Badaun gang rape exposed how gravely at risk women and minors lacking domestic toilets are, India's sanitation scenario remains dire. Social worker and Padma Bhushan awardee ​Bindeshwar Pathak is founder of Sulabh Sanitation Movement, an organisation that helps build low-cost toilets across the country. Speaking with Fozia Yasin, Pathak discussed the socio-economic costs of lacking proper sanitation, practical ways to correct this...

-The Business Standard   The government needs counter cyclical policies to tackle vegflation, which has become a recurrent problem Somebody help. Narendra Modi and Arun Jaitley are held hostage, not by jihadists, recalcitrant opposition, international capital or the ever-erratic monsoon, but by faceless, nameless manipulators of Nasik, Navi Mumbai and Azadpur markets. The "raw" terror they have let loose resounds in the corridors of government as well as media power. Cutting to the chase,...

-The Times of India   NEW DELHI: The highways ministry is looking at entering into long-term contracts with cement majors across the country to purchase the construction material at a lower cost and shift to concrete roads, which are seen to be more durable although they cost more than those made using bitumen. Road transport and highways minister Nitin Gadkari - who had announced his support for concrete the day he took...

-Down to Earth   Most severely and consistently excluded groups are women, Adivasis, Muslims and the disabled, report confirms A recent report by a Delhi NGO undermines government claims on reaching welfare schemes to the needy and disadvantaged sections of society. The report, titled The India Exclusion Report 2013-14, says the government has failed miserably in providing equal access to public goods to the most disadvantaged groups. The report, prepared by Delhi-based Centre for...

-The Financial Express   With newer varieties and improvement in yield, packaging and marketing, basmati-long hailed as the ‘king of rice'-is spreading its sweet aroma worldwide WALK INTO any supermarket today and the most eye-catching items will be in the section selling packaged rice. Rice, that humble, century-old staple of the Indian diet, has emerged from its traditional image-grains in an open gunny bag-to a slick new avatar. Today, rice, and basmati in...