Malnutrition deaths in Maharashtra's tribal belt expose indifference of successive governments. (Editorial)

he number of "poor" derived by applying price adjustment to an old consumption basket, which is largely what official poverty measures have done, are very different from estimates based on actual consumption baskets that have changed over time. For instance, the share of cereals in household expenditure halved between 1993-94 and 2011-12 in rural areas. In the light of this, we ask if all expenditure would be on food, what percentage of the population would be unable to meet the prescribed calorie requirement?

The chairperson of the Committee for Evolution of the New Education Policy writes on the committee's findings and what ails education in India today.

In 2010, the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy proposed a 20% subsidy for electric vehicles through a scheme called the Alternate Fuels for Surface Transportation Programme. This resulted in a big leap in sales of electric vehicles, mostly in the e-bikes segment. However, this initial spurt in sales was followed by a slump. This article analyses why electrical vehicles have not taken off in India, and suggests alternatives.

A vast majority of studies assessing the impact of R&D tax incentives provided across the world conclude that such tax incentives spur investments. However, in India only a limited number of fi rms, especially small and medium ones, have actually been taking advantage of the state’s fi scal generosity.

The poor record of public and private sector industries across sectors to submit the mandatory environmental information on an annual basis reveals the shortcomings of the existing environmental regulatory process. This article attempts to evaluate the current status of firm level environmental information available with the regulators and suggests some measures to streamline, standardise, and strengthen the current regulatory system to enable better compliance by firms.

The Safai Karamchari Andolan traversed 500 districts of the country with the message "stop killing us." The participants, manual scavengers who clean dry latrines, sewers and septic tanks, are forced to carry on this dehumanising work despite laws against it. Will the Swachh Bharat campaign succeed in addressing the issues connected with manual scavenging?

This article attempts to unravel the underlying reasoning behind the contemporary practice of "trophy hunting." It uses deontology to critique the debate on trophy hunting, which, it reckons, is based on utilitarianism. This debate is wrongly pitched between those who consider trophy hunting as economically viable and those who decry this viability. This understanding treats environment as "unrelated" or "irrelevant" domain for the economic benefits, denies its intrinsic value and makes its instrumental use as a collective norm.

Data from seven decades of survey in Palanpur provide insights into the changing nature of the village economy. Starting as a predominantly agrarian economy, Palanpur has seen non-farm employment emerge as a major driver of growth and distribution of income in the village economy, but accompanied by increasing inequality. There is evidence of greater mobility among the disadvantaged in Palanpur alongside falling inter-generational mobility.

Rampant deforestation, extensive damming of the rivers, huge diversions of water for industrial projects and even elite resorts can be seen across the state. All these underlie Maharashtra’s terrible water crisis. They won’t get washed away by the monsoon, even if media coverage of it dries up with the onset of the rains.