In an important revelation, a recent study in one of the world’s most renowned health research journals, “Lancet”, has found that “model” Gujarat is one of the three states where the Suicide Death Rate (SDR) among women has gone up. The other two major states, whose women’s SDR has shown an upward trend during the 26-years study – 1990 to 2016 – period are Bihar and Rajasthan.

Thousands of adivasis and forest dwellers from across Odisha, mostly from tribal regions, marched in a protest rally on September 28 under the banner of Campaign for Survival and Dignity (CSD), Odisha, at Lower PMG, Bhubaneswar, raising concern over “anti-tribal” and “anti-forest dweller” laws like Compensatory Afforestation Fund Act, 2016 (commonly known as CAMPA) and Draft National Forest Policies 2018.

  A 13-state survey carried out a Delhi-based non-profit organization, CMS India, has found that in “model” Gujarat’s just about 12% households households feel that the Narendra Modi government is “committed” towards reducing corruption, which is the lowest of all states, with the sole exception of Andhra Pradesh, where just about 2% of feel that way.

Hundreds of elderly, widows, single women and differently-abled persons from different districts of Jharkhand gathered near the Raj Bhavan in Ranchi for a public hearing organized by the Jharkhand Right to Food Campaign and Pension Parishad demanding the right to universal social security pensions ahead of World Elderly Day on October 1.

A just-published paper, “Political role models and child marriage in India”, has concluded that the 73rd and 74th constitutional amendments, enacted in 1993, which stipulate reservation of pradhans’ positions in one-third of districts by rotation, has led to a situation where the “likelihood of child marriage decreases by 20 percentage points, and age at marriage increases by 2.3 years”, even as delaying the “gauna ceremony is delayed by 1.6 years.”

  A recent research paper, “The impact of women’s age at marriage on own and spousal labor market outcomes in India: causation or selection?” has said that even though women earn nearly half of what men earn, a delay in marriage, at least in India, has “no significant impact” on their earnings.

Sharply contesting Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s claim that the  recently-launched  public health insurance scheme, Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (PMJAY), dubbed Modicare, is the world’s largest, renowned development economist Jean Drèze notes, PMJAY is nowhere comparable to “China’s health care system, with its universal coverage”, pointing out, “In per-capita terms, public expenditure on health in China is about five times higher than in India.”

Indian tent turtle, captured in TWS If a wildlife sanctuary is unable to preserve a particular species because of certain extraneous reasons, why not do away with it right away? This appears to be the new motto behind the BJP rulers in Uttar Pradesh, frantically wanting to implement Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ambitious inland waterway project on Ganga. The waterway is slated to pass through Varanasi, Modi’s constituency.

  Fresh data released by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), released this month, show that while India ranks 130 out of 189 countries in human development index (HDI), with HDI value of 0.640 on a scale of 1, this is “below the average of 0.645 for countries in the medium human development group”, even though it is “above the average of 0.638 for countries in South Asia.”

The United Nations special rapporteur on contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance, Tendayi Achiume, in a new  report  to the UN General Assembly, has revealed that she has written a letter to the Government of India taking strong exception to "updating of the National Register of Citizens (NRC), a process governed by local authorities in the state of Assam."

The Indian railway authorities on Saturday “bulldozed” about 50 make-shift shanties near the Sabarmati Railway Overbidge. Vipul Pandya, a civil rights activist, says that this was done “because on October 2, Prime Minister Narendra Modi is to visit Ahmedabad for the Gandhi Jayant.” Pointing out that these make-shift shanties belong to adivasi workers, who migrate to Ahmedabad in search of jobs in construction sites from the eastern tribal belt, Pandya said, earlier, a warning was issued by Railway authorities, Ahmedabad, which had warned these workers to vacate the site by September 15. The letter, forwarded to Counterview, said, the area “belongs to the Indian Railways and the shanties put up there are unauthorized, hence these should be vacated, otherwise these removed to clear the land.” Meanwhile, commenting on the development, Gujarat's well-known child rights activist Sukhdev Patel says, "There has been a criticism over the way a girl  was  abused  at the Rajpath Cl...

The United Nations (UN) secretary-general’s  annual report  to the ongoing 39th session of the Human Rights Council has taken strong exception to the manner the Government of India has been using “reprisals” against the human rights defenders who have been “cooperating” with the United Nations’ (UN’s) different panels.

  The Chinese Communist Party Central Committee's powerful English language daily "Global Times" has taken strong exception to what it has called "twice-postponed two plus two ministerial dialogue between the US and India", which took place on September 6 in New Delhi, saying the meetings suggest "India views China as the main threat to its rise."

  By Rajiv Shah  Gallup, a well-known American research-based global performance-management consulting company with expertise in public opinion polls, has said that Indians' life ratings have been consistently going down, from 5 on a scale 10 in 2010 to to 4 in 2017. Pointing out that India's life ratings “are especially low in the rural East”, where almost half of residents "struggle to afford food", Gallup, in its new findings has predicted, regional disparities “may affect 2019 parliamentary elections.”

Danish Rajab Jhat The well-known American journal "Time", in a report exclusively focussed on the controversial use of the pallet guns to quell disturbances in the Kashmir Valley in 2016, taking the testimony of nine victims, has said that all of their scars, caused by what are called "non-lethal" weapons, have pushed them, as also hundreds others, fully or partially into "darkness."

By Our Representative Taking strong exception to the arrest of Jacob Vadakkanchery, a practitioner and advocate of naturopathy, purportedly on the directions from Kerala’s Health Minister KK Shailaja, the National Alliance of People's Movements (NAPM) has said it is "another example of intolerance towards voices of dissent and an attempt to throttle them." The arrest is said to be for “sharing misleading information on rat fever” and “questioned the authenticity of the leptospirosis preventive medicine prescribed by the government”. Jacob is a known critic of the over dependence and unquestioned use and promotion of allopathic medicines, without disclosing the side effects of the same. He has questioned the mighty and powerful pharmaceutical companies for spreading panic among public to amass profit at the cost of human lives. Last week "The Indian Express" reported that the Indian arm of Johnson & Johnson, the giant pharma company, deliberately suppressed k...

The World Bank in its latest assessment has found the Ganga rejuvenation project “unsatisfactory and risky”, underlining, the risk today is “substantial”. Noting this, a two-series report on Ganga says, this is a clear departure from its earlier assessment in the report “Implementation Status and Result Report” of May 2018 when it found the project’s implementation “moderately unsatisfactory”.

  A just released study has found that India has the distinction of having the third highest number of gun-related deaths out of 195 countries surveyed. Published by the American Medical Association, the study, released on August 28, shows that a total of 26,500 firearm-related deaths took place in India in 2016. Brazil tops the list with 43,200 deaths, followed by United States 37,200.

Three senior economists, one of whom is a member of the Monetary Policy Committee of the Reserve Bank of India, Prof Ravindra H Dholakia, have questioned the methodology adopted by the Government of India in 2015 for calculating gross domestic product (GDP), suggesting, while replacing the base year from 2004-05 to 2011–12, a much higher industrial growth rate has been estimated than what actually is the case.

Sharply criticizing the Government of India for the “withdrawal of the state from the public sphere, especially that pertaining to where the majority of Indians and especially women live and labour”, a UN Women-sponsored study says that there has been “declining investment in public provisioning of… goods and services that have a direct impact on … unpaid and paid work of women.”

Phule, Ambedkar A Government of India (GoI) advisory, issued by the Ministry of Information & Broadcasting (I&B) has, in a surprise move, asked media to refrain from using the word Dalit. Seeking "Urgent compliance with court order", the advisory says that it is "advised that media may refrain from using the nomenclature Dalit, while referring to members belonging to Scheduled Caste, in compliance with the directions of the Bombay High Court and the Constitutional term Scheduled Caste in English."

A top New York-based data analysis firm, CEIC Data, has  revealed  that India's investment accounted for 30.8 % of its nominal GDP in March 2018, a little higher than 30.1 % in the previous quarter. However, it conceded, India's investment share of nominal GDP data from June 2004 to March 2018 averaged 35.1 %, as against the all-time high of 41.2 % in September 2011. It reached a record low of 29.6 % in March 2017, post-demonetization.

Nobel laureate Amartya Sen in early 1990s, referring to fact that there are far more men than women in India, relative to developed countries, dubbed this as "the missing women phenomenon". The reasons he cited included sex-selective abortion and excess female mortality at early ages due to parental preferences for sons.

Moments before the violence began in Kasganj. All pix from the report By Our Representative A report, jointly prepared by three Indian civil rights groups, two US-based groups and a London-based group, has described the probe into the January 26 Kasganj (Uttar Pradesh) violence a sham. The incident became controversial because, during the incident, in a town “which is 220 km east of New Delhi”, one man, Chandan Gupta was “shot amid firing, arson and vandalism.”