While, the threats of a nuclear fall-out, borne out of a tragedy that happened in the Fakushima Nuke Plant in Japan, started a debate about the positives and negatives of nuclear energy. The media completely ignored the protests and the cries that were being carried out (in fact, for the last 10 to 15 years) in Northern Kerala as well as Southern Karnataka to ban the Pesticide Endosulfan. Perhaps, after the...

The cheapest car in the world proved the costliest for a 34-year-old Left Front CPI-M government in India’s eastern state of West Bengal, as the communists lost the elections here by a wide margin. The outcome is the result of an anti-left movement that began in 2006 following the controversial takeover of farmland to create a manufacturing plant for Tata Motors’ small family vehicle called the ‘Nano’. A sweep by a regional...

States are not sure if they will receive funds under the government’s flagship rural employment programme on time this year. Glitches in a governmentdeveloped software last year had delayed the digitised submission of progress reports by states, which is mandatory for sanction of funds under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGA). The ensuing delay in sanction of funds stalled ongoing work and affected implementation of new ones....

That India marries off its daughters in such a hurry that they have little time to grow out of their teens is a fact that no longer raises eyebrows. But what should come as a shock to a country that preens itself over its growing economic prowess is that we fare worse than sub-Saharan Africa, or for that matter, all of Africa put together, when it comes to child marriage. If...

The CSR has declined in 27 States and Union Territories, recording an all-time low, while the adult sex ratio has improved, though slowly. WHEN the provisional data from Census 2011 were released on March 31, the worst fears of those working in the area of women and child development were confirmed. The horror of a declining child sex ratio (CSR), which first came to light in Census 2001, returned once again,...