Too Many Indians Find It’s Better to Die

When Sarath, 29, a security staffer with a private firm in Kattakada town in India’s southern Kerala state hanged himself at his office premises, his death became a grim reminder of what statistics in the country have been showing for some time now: more and more young Indian men are succumbing to socio-economic pressures and are committing suicide.

India Illegal Mining Enquiry Cut Short

A nationwide enquiry into illegal mining in India was aborted before it completed its investigation into the failings of the country’s mining industry. The study had prompted the government to ban mining in two states and arrest high-ranking politicians.

India Beats a Cyclone

“No casualties have been reported till now,” India’s National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) declared at 9:30 am the morning after the near Super Cyclone ‘Phailin’ made landfall in India’s east.

Parallel Economy Keeps Indians Poor

As India grapples with rising prices and a rapidly sinking rupee, attention has turned to the country's massive parallel economy that siphons wealth away from development programmes and into the pockets of a corrupt ruling elite.

Relief Brings Its Own Disasters

In Uttarakhand, the small Indian state in the Himalayan foothills that was a victim of flash floods that killed at least a thousand people in June this year and uprooted thousands of families, the story is told of a child who went every day to the helipad, believing his father will return when, in fact, the father died in the floods.

Free Lunches Come at an Environmental Cost

In spite of India’s much-publicised national renewable energy policy as part of its international commitments to reduce carbon emissions, its Mid Day Meal (MDM) Scheme, the world’s largest school lunch programme, has no energy conservation or even a fuel policy in its workings.

Widows Celebrate a Little At Last

Namuna Gautam was among millions of Indian women who celebrated Rakshabandhan this year, but one thing set her apart. It was the first time the 80-year-old took part in the festival, in which sisters pray for the long life, health and happiness of their brothers.

GM Seeks New Pastures in Pakistan

After a string of setbacks in India in recent years, the genetically modified seed industry is now targeting Pakistan as its next frontier, say activists.

Angry Birds Skip Polluted Delhi

Every winter the Okhla wetlands, a charmed haven in the heart of India’s bustling capital city, play host to Greater Flamingoes, Greylag Geese, Tufted Pochards, Northern Shovelers and other exotic, feathered visitors winging in from colder climes as far away as Siberia.

When Disaster Rains, Talk

Gulam Rasul, chief meteorologist at the Pakistan Meteorological Department, was sure early this month that the second leg of the annual monsoon due in the latter half of the month was going to be bad. “Normally it peaks towards late August,” Rasul told IPS.

India and China Oil Palms Dangerously

When there is feasting in India, Pakistan and Bangladesh, there could just be a connection between the celebrations and the fires on Indonesia’s Sumatra Island that trigger frequent transboundary smog.

Reverse Migration Haunts Kerala

Raju Das from the north-eastern Indian state Assam migrated to the southern Indian state Kerala two years ago to join the construction boom. Kerala has emerged as the new magnet drawing workers from around India.

Part of Indian Heritage Site Bulldozed for a Road

The village of Hampi located in India's southern state of Karnataka has long been an attraction for tourists from all over the world.

Seeking More Indian Business, With Chinese Help

As he stood on the westernmost edge of Colombo’s new harbour expansion, it was hard for Priyath Bandu Wickrema - the man tasked with reinventing the port as a regional giant - to cap his enthusiasm.

India Moves to Protect the Rented Womb

India’s matinee idol Shah Rukh Khan and his wife Gauri Khan announced recently that they had their third child through surrogacy. Gossip columns said that Gauri Khan, a mother of two teenagers, had tried to conceive for the last couple of years and at last resorted to surrogacy.

Will Prayers Save Farmers in the Land of the Gods?

Over a month after flash floods in the Himalayan state of Uttarakhand in north India left 1,000 dead and 6,000 missing, the government has yet to release a full agricultural impact assessment, sparking fears about the extent of damage to the region’s farmland.

Making Peace with Our Futures

Future studies, like peace-development-environment studies, is an interdisciplinary, international effort to get a grip on key issues, divided into ‘preferred futures’ – utopias – whose?; ‘predicted futures’ – forecasting – who does it, for whom?; and ‘future practice’ – scenarios bending the predicted toward the preferred – by and for whom?

Protests in India over School Meal Tragedy

At least 22 people in northern India, mostly children, have died and dozens were hospitalised in critical condition after apparently being poisoned by a primary school meal.

Are Middle Class Protests Fallout from Poverty Alleviation?

The rise of the "global middle class" is widely attributed to the gradual eradication of extreme poverty in the developing world, even as the United Nations says that millions of people in countries such as India, China and Brazil have graduated from the ranks of the indigent.

Stronger Laws to Deter Acid Attacks on Women

Preeti Rathi was just 25 years old when she passed away in a Mumbai hospital exactly a month after a man threw acid on her while she stood waiting on a railway platform.

A Floral Touch to Employment in Kashmir

As a little girl, Rubeena Begum had big plans: she would become a doctor and secure a decent income working in one of the 30 hospitals in the Himalayan state of Kashmir in north India.