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Dance bar ahead: Keep out : Part 1: Fundamentalisms and sexuality The state government has embarked on a campaign to rid Mumbai of obscenity. The dance bars which employ 75,000 women, are amongst the targets. But is this just about dance bars or about the increasingly strident notions of purity and pollution, and about fundamentalism using the bodies of women as their locus of control? More... Dance bar ahead: Keep out: Part 2: The right to sexualityThe ban on dance bars in Mumbai is ostensibly to protect youth from the sexualised environment of the bars. Instead of keeping the shadows and silences around sexuality intact, we need a rights-based approach to young people's sexuality, giving them the right to information that has a direct bearing on their health and well-being More... Why not cash for work?Is the government's Food For Work Programme really helping to 'empower' the poor? By paying for their labour in foodgrain the implication is: the poor are hungry, let them eat food. But what about their other needs including medicines, homes, schoolbooks, social emergencies... More... Indian solutions for Indian wasteIndia generates mind-boggling quantities of waste: 320 million tonnes of agricultural waste and 4.4 million tonnes of hazardous waste every year. But Indian garbage, which consists of around 85% organic matter, is not suited to the burn technologies that we are importing from the West to manage our solid waste. What are the alternatives? More... Brewing tensions in adivasi IndiaFrom the eviction of adivasis from forestlands in Madhya Pradesh's Burhanpur district to the continued threat to their lives from the army's routine firing exercises in Netarhat, Jharkhand, tribal populations throughout India are being exploited, intimidated and further alienated. The sharpening conflict between the adivasis and the Indian state must be addressed More... Holding economists accountable for faulty policiesA global academic fraternity is trying to push globalisation by creating the illusion that it reduces poverty, eliminates hunger and promotes economic growth for all. Why shouldn't we hold these economists responsible for faulty economic reasoning and policies that keep thousands of people in poverty and rob farmers of their livelihoods, asks Devinder Sharma More... World Bank shifts gear on water privatisationThere appears to have been an imperceptible shift in the World Bank's stand, away from privatisation being the only answer to the world's water crisis, towards a more pragmatic approach of public-private investments. On World Water Day, March 22, Indian non-government organisations and civil society groups will review trends towards private investments in the country More... Midday meals don't work for dalit children49.35% of dalit children drop out of school at the primary level, 67.77% at the junior high school level, and 77.65% by high school. Clearly, midday meal schemes have failed to check the dropout rate of dalit children. What are the alternatives? More... Property and rights: Owning ideas, fish and forestsAll debates about property – whether it’s water, medicines or a piece of music – revolve around two fundamental questions: who should have the rights to own and benefit from the property; and what should those rights consist of? More... Citizens who seek redressA citizen in India tends to go to the public authorities 13 times to get a single complaint redressed! But increasingly, citizens are putting the State and its governance under the scanner. At a recent workshop 'Developing Mechanisms for Public Accountability in Urban Services', experts emphasised the ways in which citizens are being empowered to seek redress More... Community funding for long-term, post-tsunami rehabilitationNow that victims of the devastating Indian Ocean tsunami have been provided immediate relief, governments and voluntary organisations must do some out-of-the-box thinking to create a permanent source of funding for development efforts. In this connection, the community foundation model offers the greatest possibility for decentralised and long-term funding of local needs More... |
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