A government which believes that medical education and healthcare are best provided by the private sector is deliberately starving government hospitals of funds. Until a clear plan to ensure health for all is in place and the poor demand medical care as a fundamental right, public health services will remain skewed and unjust.

It is possible today to voice a proposal to take the idea of primary health care, stated in the bold language of the Alma-Ata declaration 30 years ago, forward and work towards making it a reality.

Upon an examination of the development of health services in India, it is evident that the primary health care strategy was a logical outcome and justification for health policies that were (and are) antithetical to the principle of social justice.

This paper studies the problem of poor health outcomes in India from the demand side, and using the unit level data from the 60th round of the National Sample Survey analyses the determinants of not accessing medical care. This analysis is confined to persons who have reported being ill within 15 days of the survey but have not sought either public or private professional medical services.

How one measures poverty and inequality has implications for a variety of policy interventions relating to fair allocation in a number of institutional settings. The distribution of international aid is an important case in point.

The Kosi afflux bundh breached in Kusaha in Nepal on 18 August 2008. This was the eighth incident of its kind and the first time did a breach occur upstream of the Kosi Barrage. The ones in 1968 and 1984 were no less disastrous but this year

The recent Kosi floods have proved once again that inadequate control measures have been responsible for the recurring disasters. Typically flood control and riverine studies focus on hydrological information, whereas a much more integrated approach that pays attention to specific morphological factors is required.

A combination of short- and long-term measures that gives importance to both structural (traditional) means and non-structural techniques is required to solve the perennial flood problem in north Bihar.

The strategy of building embankments to constrain river flow and to prevent floods in north Bihar has proven to be questionable and flawed. Reliance on a dam-and-reservoir system for that purpose only offers limited protection and even greater risks of flooding in case of damage.

In the short run, India is not going to benefit from the free trade agreement with the Association of South-East Asian Nations that was finalised recently. ASEAN is not a natural trading partner of India, and, unlike China, India has not established close relations with the region.