World Health Statistics 2015: some achievements, many concerns
Down To Earth highlights the world’s performance on health-related development goals, where our successes lie and where efforts are still a …
Mahan at all costs
How government bent all rules to ensure Mahan forest in Madhya Pradesh goes to Essar and Hindalco for mining coal
Reason for Bhutan’s happy face
The Himalayan kingdom has managed to significantly reduce its poverty level, but a section remains at risk of falling back into poverty
Jobless growth comes to haunt beleaguered UPA government
Any job creation policy will have to refocus on ecology that has been giving employment to a large section of the population
The gas game
Fluorocarbons, which created a hole in the ozone layer, have generated intense global debates. But these have been more about business than …
Grim news on jobs front for women
About nine million women went out of the job market in the rural areas between 2009-10 and 2011-12, a grim facet of the employment crisis in …
Welfare schemes benefited only a quarter of urban slums: NSSO
Over 30 per cent urban slums across India have no toilets or drainage facilities, in spite of funds being made available under JNNURM and other …
Dwindle, peak and pine
"HEALTH for all by the year 2000" was the proclaimed objective of the Primary Health Care Conference held at Alma-Ata in 1978 under the aegis of …
Pregnant with meaning
FAR from the media hoopla, the developing world is quietly undergoing a reproductive revolution. According to a report released by the World …
Flood plains of India
India receives an annual rainfall of 400 million hectare metres, of which 75 per cent is received in four months. Floods generally follow, …
The US learns that green laws make sense after all
Make no mistake, US President George W Bush's office has conceded that green laws make sound economic sense. Although the White House reiterated …
Blow to anti-AIDS campaign as condom turns taboo subject
The paanwallah-doubling-up-as-a-condom-vendor ad has been taken off the air. Instead, Doordarshan will show a village council member warning …
Drained India's inland wetlands
During the last ten years, India has lost about 38 per cent of its inland wetlands; in some districts, as much as 88 per cent of the wetlands …
Children of a lesser State
A rare killer disease, Japanese encephalitis, has been annually and invariably breaking out in eastern Uttar Pradesh, India. This year, so far, 3,…
How MGNREGA blew Rs 10,853 crore
The “little known” success story of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) has unfolded as a disaster. …
Vaccine Eloquent
Universal vaccination became part of government policy in 1978. A quarter of a century since, progress has been fitful. In some parts of the …
Resurgent polio
Eradicating polio in India is proving to be a tough ask. The disease, which seemed to have been contained a few years ago, is rearing its head …
Theirs to mine?
This is the question angry and beleaguered tribals in Orissa and Jharkhand are asking, as mining companies set up shop in the midst of their land …
The political economy of defecation
This is a story about Delhi and the Yamuna, about the relationship between one of India's richest cities and one of her most revered rivers. The …
SEZ, how special?
Despite having burned its fingers with export processing zones, which mainly involved a number of substantial fiscal benefits, the government has …
Brinksman
As Le Clemenceau bobs on the horizon, reactions in India get sharper, noisier. We've discovered occupational safety. Asbestos is used in …
Saga of two villages
Sukhomajri was a dirt-poor village in Haryana. It started pulling itself out of its hole in the late 1970s, making a dizzying ascent to …
Astray?
From the Gir National Park in Gujarat to the Sunderbans in West Bengal, lions and tigers are ranging far beyond territories administered by the …
The small big polluter
Small-scale industries: Where regulations are meaningless and pollution control an unaffordable luxury. Can they leapfrog to cost-effective …
30,000 farmers demand Hirakud dam water
Western Orissa is witnessing an upheaval. In the eye of the storm is the Hirakud dam. Over 300,000 farmers dependent on its water for irrigation …