Parley by The Hindu

In 2022, a Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS)-Lokniti survey in partnership with the Konrad Adenauer Stiftung showed that TV channels dominate as the news source in India, despite poor trust levels in them. In 2023, a Global Fact 10 research report showed that more and more Indians are now placing their trust in YouTube and WhatsApp for news. Are independent journa

Ayushman Bharat, the government’s flagship programme to achieve universal health coverage (UHC), was launched in 2018. The scheme has two inter-related components: health and wellness centres and the Pradhan Mantri Jan Arogya Yojana (PMJAY) that aims to provide a health cover of ₹5 lakh per family per year for secondary and tertiary care hospitalisation to over 12 crore familie

The Green Credit Programme, announced by the Environment Ministry in October 2023, is a market-based mechanism where individuals and companies can claim incentives called ‘green credits’ for contributions to environmental and ecological restoration. However, there is criticism that these initiatives may be used to circumvent existing laws, particularly those that deal with fore

Earlier this month, following a report in The Guardian stating that the Indian government had killed about 20 people in Pakistan since 2020 as part of a broader plan to eliminate terrorists on foreign soil, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh responded that India will enter Pakistan to kill terrorists. A few days later, Prime Minister Narendra Modi, too, said that under a strong governm

Bengaluru, often celebrated for being a ‘garden city’, the ‘IT capital’ of the country, and its pleasant weather, has been making headlines this year for facing a severe water crisis following the drought of 2023. The water crisis is also likely to hit other urban centres and rural areas. According to a recent weekly bulletin by the Central Water Commission, even as peak su

Many companies that faced regulatory action from the Enforcement Directorate (ED) or Income Tax (IT) Department donated electoral bonds worth crores of rupees to ruling parties via the electoral bonds route, show data submitted by the State Bank of India (SBI) to the Election Commission of India (ECI). Some companies which got huge government contracts purchased bonds for large amo

Recently, hours after resigning as a judge of the Calcutta High Court, Abhijit Gangopadhyay announced that he was joining the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). The judge’s decision to join politics and the manner in which it was taken has raised questions of judicial impropriety. Some people disapprove of the practice of judges holding official posts after retirement; they believe th

NITI Aayog B.V.R. Subrahmanyam recently claimed that less than 5% of Indians now live below the poverty line. He made the claim based on the findings of the Household Consumption Expenditure Survey (HCES), 2022-23. Mr. Subrahmanyam argued that the average consumption expenditure in the bottom 5% of India’s population, as estimated by the survey, is about the same as the poverty l

On February 13, groups of farmers began a march to New Delhi, to press for fulfilment of their demands, which include a legal guarantee for purchasing crops at Minimum Support Price (MSP) and India’s withdrawal from the World Trade Organization (WTO) which, they allege, places pressure on the Centre for drafting policies for procurement and MSP. While the Centre has fixed MSP for

Recently, music composer A.R. Rahman tweeted that the song Thimiri Yezhuda from the Tamil film Lal Salaam uses an Artificial Intelligence (AI) software to recreate the voices of singers Bamba Bakya and Shahul Hameed. Bakya died in September 2022 at the age of 42 and has sung songs in films including 2.0 and Bigil. Hameed, who died in 1998, worked extensively on movies such as Gentl