-The Indian Express In steel city Rourkela, a massive drinking water crisis is unfolding in the Rourkela Steel Plant township due to the drying up of the river Koel which provides water to the city. With no let-up in intense heatwave conditions in Odisha and over 59 sunstroke deaths being reported across the state, the government yesterday asked all schools in the state to extend their closure till April 26. Early this...

-The Indian Express Of the Rs 80,310 crore the 26 states allotted to SCSP schemes in 2012-13, when the UPA government was in power at the Centre, Rs 61,480 crore was spent. WITH various political parties staking claim to the legacy of Dr B R Ambedkar on his 125th birth anniversary, the latest annual report by the Scheduled Caste Commission has found that almost all states have failed to honour their budgetary...

-The Hindu Vijayapura (Karnataka): While the government has initiated several schemes to tackle the problem of malnourishment among children, the University of Horticulture Sciences, Bagalkot, has come up with an innovative idea to effectively deal with this problem. According to the university, the project, if implemented, would not only address the issue of malnourishment but has also multiple advantages, including spreading awareness among children on the importance of horticulture. Vasant Ganiger, professor, Department...

-The Hindu Business Line The priority for this government is to promote the medical care market, not ensure universal healthcare for the majority Those at the helm of policymaking in the country have been, for some time, strongly advocating austerity as the principle for public expenditure policies, particularly for the social sectors. Arvind Panagariya, the vice-chairperson of the NITI Aayog, suggests that “for just three-quarters of a per cent of the GDP”, 0.76...

-The Economic Times NEW DELHI: As many as 882 deaths in five years, nearly four-fifths of them in a single state. These statistics do not pertain to some inexorable natural calamities. These are figures of tribal children who lost their lives in state-run residential schools across the country between 2010 and 2015. These are numbers of innocent lives lost seemingly on account of sheer official apathy, manifest in the lack of basic...