Languages
Saturday, May 16, 2026
News and Views from the Global South
RIGHTS-INDIA: Law to Restrict Foreign Funding Alarms NGOs
Voluntary and charitable organisations in India are aghast at a new law to restrict foreign contributions, that was passed by both Houses of Parliament recently.HEALTH-INDIA: Infant Deaths Cast Doubt on Vaccination Policy
The deaths of four infants during a recent vaccination drive in Lucknow, capital of northern Uttar Pradesh state, has raised questions about the Indian government's plan to introduce five-in-one vaccines in a countrywide immunisation programme.ENVIRONMENT-INDIA: Green Activists Gain Ground with Successive Victories
Green activists in India have chalked up a series of successes recently and feel heartened that the central government is heeding their call. A number of mega projects which would have displaced vulnerable communities or caused damage to the environment were recently scrapped by the government.HEALTH-INDIA: Superbug Boosts Hopes of Rational Drug Use
Howls of protest from doctors and officials in India have followed the naming of the New Delhi Metallo-1 (NDM-1), a gene that can transform infectious bacteria into superbugs that are resistant to the most powerful antibiotics. But other experts hope that the furore on this issue may lead to a rethink on the widespread practice of using medicines indiscriminately.INDIA: Moving On to a ‘Backward’ Step
Strident voices are rising against the Indian coalition government's move to identify people by their caste background in the ongoing census.INDIA: End to Fuel Subsidies Brings Damaging Diversions
While India's opposition parties are agitating against moves by the pro-reform government of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to remove subsidies on petrol and other fuels, experts say the country has laboured too long under price distortions that have not benefited poorer people -- or the environment.
ENVIRONMENT-INDIA: Fighting Drought With Check Dams
Gazing out at the lush greenery that surrounds the village of Salaita in northern India, a smile of satisfaction appears on retired army general A.P.S. Chauhan's face.New Indian Vaccines Fight H1N1
At a time when the World Health Organisation (WHO) faces charges that it hyped up the swine flu pandemic to benefit pharmaceutical companies, India is sprucing up its indigenous capacity to manufacture vaccines against the H1N1 virus.INDIA: Hanging for Pakistani Sets Back Anti-Death Penalty Campaign
The death sentence awarded to Pakistani national Mohammed Ajmal Kasab, 22, for his role in the 2008 terror attack on the western port city of Mumbai that killed 166 people is being seen as a setback to a campaign to have the extreme punishment abolished in India.POLITICS: Not Quite Cricket – India’s Most Popular Sport on Trial
Allegations that India’s junior foreign minister Shashi Tharoor had swung outsize ‘sweat equity’ for a female friend in a newly floated professional cricket league franchise may have cost him his job, but it may also expose the multi- million dollar India Premium League (IPL) as a massive money-laundering enterprise.
DEVELOPMENT-INDIA: Banking on Women
Rinki Kumari’s white laminate-topped desk at the Bank of India’s branch here in Sahdeokhap village in eastern Bihar state is easily the busiest, with men, women and even children crowding around her.POLITICS-INDIA: Bhopal Legacy Haunts Nuclear Liability Bill
The U.S.-based multinational Union Carbide got away lightly after causing the world’s worst industrial tragedy at Bhopal, but that legacy has come to haunt U.S. corporations seeking to tap India’s newly opened market for nuclear power equipment.
INDIA: No Stopping Reserved Seats for Women in Parliament
With assured backing from India's main opposition groups, the ruling Congress party hopes to see voted through in the upper house of Parliament Monday a bill reserving 33 percent of seats in national and provincial legislatures for women.
Q&A: More Women Journalists Doesn’t Mean More Gender Awareness
Young Indian women are taking to journalism in droves, but Ammu Joseph, author of several authoritative books on women in media, believes that these numbers do not necessarily translate into gender awareness.MEDIA-INDIA: More Women Now, But Few in Top Posts
Young Indian women are increasingly taking to careers in journalism, but this trend is restricted to the metropolises and to non-decision making positions in media organisations, leading women journalists say.BIODIVERSITY: India Bans Farming of GM Aubergine
After India’s Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh announced Tuesday a ban on the cultivation of Bt brinjal, the country’s first genetically modified (GM) food crop, food security experts and activists said this major farming country has been saved from a biodiversity disaster.
RIGHTS-INDIA: Commonwealth Games: No Medals for Labourers
If medals are being given out for backbreaking labour on miserable wages and impossible working conditions, thousands of migrant workers, slaving to complete stadia and other facilities for the October Commonwealth Games in the Indian capital, will be the champions.CLIMATE CHANGE: ‘Copenhagen Accord Not Legal, Kyoto Protocol Is’
While the BASIC bloc countries - Brazil, South Africa, India and China - will submit their plans for voluntary mitigation actions by the Jan. 31 deadline stipulated by the Copenhagen Accord, they have taken care to emphasise that the agreement, reached at the end of the December climate change summit in the Danish capital, has no legal basis.CLIMATE CHANGE: After Copenhagen, Back to Basics for BASIC Bloc
As environment ministers from Brazil, South Africa, India and China (BASIC) prepared to meet in the Indian capital on Sunday to draw up a post-Copenhagen strategy, there were great expectations on the role they could play in pushing a consensus on how the world should go about dealing with climate change.
RIGHTS-INDIA: Shelter for the Homeless amid Big Chill
Happiness for Alok and Saddam is the bare canvas tent set up in the middle of a grassy traffic island close to Delhi Gate, the entrance to the old quarter of India’s capital.DEVELOPMENT: India Holds Public Meetings on GM Food Crop
As India's central government begins a series of public meetings across the country this month on the commercial release of genetically modified (GM) brinjal – or eggplant - in this country, activists and farmers’ groups are mobilising to oppose such a plan.« Previous Page — Next Page »
The Week with IPS
NEXT STOP - SDGs
Tracking global progress towards a sustainable world
Tracking global progress towards a sustainable world
