-The Hindu There seems to be a shift from prioritising expressways and megaports to agriculture and forests Environmental promises have made a visible entry into Tamil Nadu’s politics, along with a guarded valourisation of farmer and fisher rights over big-ticket infrastructure and industrial projects. All key parties in the 2021 Assembly polls barring the AIADMK dedicated a section for “environmental protection” in their manifestos. Setting aside the justified cynicism about fulfillment of...

-The Hindu The political emphasis on welfare interventions is insufficient to address the emerging developmental issues in the State A major concern in contemporary Indian development is the widening socio-economic disparity across groups and regions. Even when regions perform relatively better in one developmental dimension, it does not often translate into all round development. For instance, Himachal Pradesh and Kerala might have attained better levels of human development but that has not...

-The Indian Express Many BJP-ruled states deny children a food choice that could address malnutrition Two of every five Indian children are stunted. Eggs are nutrition-dense superfoods packed with proteins and essential vitamins. Washington University researchers, for example, have demonstrated with a randomized control trial that feeding infants eggs daily decreased stunted growth by almost half and underweight by three-quarters. Berkeley researchers have also validated that healthy school meals even improve test...

-Frontline.in The British government, on the basis of an 1891 report on the subhuman living conditions of “Pariahs” by James H.A. Tremenheere, Acting Collector of Chengleput, assigned 12 lakh acres of land for distribution to the “depressed classes” of the Madras Presidency to empower them socially and economically. But more than 100 years later, much of this land is in the possession of non-Dalits, and the struggle to reclaim them has...

-The Hindu The politics of patronage and personality in the State has reduced the electorate to passive recipients of welfare. “The food is good. The place is clean. Actually, I prefer the cleanliness over the menu,” P. Divaraj chuckles. “The real reason I’m here is because it’s the end of the month and I’m running out of money.” A 10-minute walk from his office to Amma Unavagam on Santhome High Road in...