Featured
Doctor on Call – Medical phone service in Chhattisgarh
Deep in the jungles of Chhattisgarh, a technological and medical revolution is underway. “I will tell you what to give the patient for gout,” says a friendly voice on the mobile phone. The pre-recorded message then outlines the way to prepare a traditional concoction of herbs and plants to treat...
#Notebandi Frontlines: Tears in India’s Onion Heartland
Prime Minister Narendra Modi would be happy with 26-year-old Deepak Patil, an onion farmer from the village of Valwadi in Malegaon Taluka, about 300 km north of Mumbai, India’s commercial capital. Patil, dressed in a grey jacket, over his white shirt and jeans, said he has a bank account, a...
Will Floating Casinos Affect the Elections Race in Goa?
Goa goes to the polls on Saturday, with the BJP, the Congress and debutant AAP locked in a three-way battle. Although opinion polls have suggested a clear majority for the BJP, the issue of off-shore casinos just might turn out to be a spoiler. When the saffron party came to...
#Notebandi Frontlines: Cashless Tribulations of India’s Tribals
Santosh Bavash, 30, said he knew about the Internet. “I’ve heard it tells you about the future,” he told IndiaSpend when we spoke to the short and thin labourer from the village of Gyanpura, in the western district of Dhar, in Madhya Pradesh (MP), one of India’s poorest states. After...
Goa: Fishing industry’s sales fall and anger rises as going cashless remains a distant dream
Gangu Kundaikar is a small-framed, saree-clad woman who rises at 3 am every day, wraps a cloth around her waist so fish do not soil her saree and takes a rented tempo to the Malim jetty in Panaji, North Goa, 8 km from her village, here in one of India’s...
Our lives are threatened because we are asking for food. It is our right, right?
“You’re asking for rights? Do you know what caste you belong to?,” the Sarpanch (Village Head) reminded Samaru Vanvashi, a Dalit resident of Bisapur village in Uttar Pradesh. Samaru had approached the Sarpanch because he had not been paid his NREGA salary since 2014 and had not received his rationed...
Ordeal of a Blind Mother – Deserted by Husband, Denied pension
Shakinaur Khatun was a happy woman till five years back, living in Malda, West Bengal. She lived with her husband and two young children in her household. But things changed when she slowly lost her eyesight due to an unknown illness. Her husband and in-laws abandoned Shakinaur and the two...
Why can women not name their husbands?
Community Correspondent Madhuri asks Sindhu, Gayatri Devi, Rita Devi and Srisati Devi the names of their husband. The women, of varying age, all smile shyly and unanimously respond that they cannot refer to their husbands by their names. The reason being the husband is a superior creature, equivalent to a...