-Frontline Former psephologist Yogendra Yadav, now a member of the political collective Swaraj Abhiyan, recently toured India’s drought-affected districts. He called it a Samvedna Yatra. During the tour, he took note of the agony in rural areas affected by what he calls “one of the worst droughts in independent India” The drought, according to him, has left farmers and the larger rural community in extreme distress, leading to damaging changes in...
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Minister’s sex determination proposal: Just how bad is the idea? -Oommen C Kurian
-Observer Research Foundation It is not often discussed in India that there was a time, not too far into the past, when the doctors from the famous All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) performed and promoted sex-selective abortions as an effective and ethical method to address India’s population problem. Some of them even suggested that “the couple keeps on reproducing just to have a son”, and prenatal determination of sex...
More »Political economy of welfare -Richard Mahapatra
-Down to Earth The BJP-led government's change of heart for big-ticket rural programmes says a lot about its dwindling political fortune India's current political season has a nostalgic tint. Congress Vice-President Rahul Gandhi has apparently met party leaders to kickstart a campaign against the National Democratic Alliance’s (NDA’S) overt efforts to softly kill the erstwhile government’s flagship programmes. Particularly, the NDA government’s political decisions to not pursue the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural...
More »Centre okays Rs 4,000 crore for 7 drought-hit States
-The Times of India NEW DELHI: The Centre on Monday approved relief assistance of over Rs 4,000 crore for seven drought-affected States from the National Disaster Relief Fund (NDRF). The maximum Rs 1,737.65 crore will be released to Tamil Nadu, followed by Rs 1,193.41 crore to Rajasthan, Rs 336.94 crore to Jharkhand, Rs 332.57 crore to Assam, Rs 280.19 crore to Andhra Pradesh, Rs 170.19 crore to Himachal Pradesh and Rs 16.02...
More »Sex determination: Answer this -Sabu M George
-The Indian Express If the government does not have the will to regulate 55,000 pre-natal diagnostic clinics, how will it track 29 million pregnancies annually? I was inspired by Maneka Gandhi’s struggle to get back her passport (impounded by the Janata Party government) as an IIT student in 1977. Her Supreme Court case led to a landmark judgment on personal liberty. Subsequently Gandhi filed petitions in courts to protect animal rights....
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