-The Times of India Following the Supreme Court order to clear forest land in possession of people whose title claims were rejected under the Forest (Rights) Act, 2006, the Maharashtra government has asked forest officials to free such land from the possession of illegal occupants. On February 22, the state government issued orders seeking to know how many claims under community forest rights (CFRs) and individual forest rights (IFRs) under FRA were...

Just a few days ahead of the Kisan Mukti March in Delhi NCR, the provisional results of the Agriculture Census 2015-16 became available in the public domain. The report, among other things, highlights the long-term problems affecting Indian agriculture including fragmentation of land holdings (particularly the marginal and small ones) and shrinking average size of farm land. The provisional results of the latest Agriculture Census reveal that at the national level...

  During the last 2-3 months, one has seen complaints related to sexual harassment surfacing on social media as part of the #MeToo campaign. Many people have questioned why the victims were so late to reveal the harassment they faced in the past. Sceptics have also asked why the victims of sexual harassment did not seek either legal or police help. If you have similar doubts in mind, then you should read...

For long, economists have argued among themselves whether income should be the only criterion for measuring poverty. After all, in real life a person can face multiple deprivations, say, in terms of access to education, health and living standards, among others. The multidimensional poverty index (MPI), which offers a valuable complement to traditional income-based poverty measures, was first introduced in the 2010 Human Development Report (HDR). The MPI looks at...

  Like last year, this year too journalists and media persons have compared India's Global Hunger Index (GHI) ranking vis-à-vis its position in previous years. Even the social media is buzzing with commentaries on the fallen GHI ranking of the country. The question remains whether such a comparison is possible. The newly released report entitled 2018 Global Hunger Index: Forced Migration and Hunger clearly says that the GHI scores are comparable within...