Feature Article

This paper presents new evidence on the links between public infrastructure provisioning and time allocation related to the water sector in India. Using time-use data, the analysis reveals that worsening public infrastructure affects market work with evident gender differentials. The results also suggest that the access to public infrastructure can lead to substitution effects in time allocation between unpaid work and market work.

The Bengal famine of 1943 is arguably the worst economic disaster of 20th century south Asia. This paper traces the background of the famine and analyses the role of the land market in fuelling food price rise. It appears that in a monetised, already famished, agrarian economy, during situations of subsistence crisis, interlinking of food and land markets has the potential to cause an exponentially high degree of disaster. The role of a universal public distribution system, which carries over food from a surplus to a deficit year, and insulates the food market, thus becomes paramount.

This article utilises the National Family Health Survey-3 data and presents an empirical assessment of income-related health inequality in India. It undertakes a state-level analysis of inequities in child health by employing the widely accepted measures of concentration curves and concentration indices. It finds that the poorer sections of the population are beleaguered with ill health whether in the quest for child survival or due to anxieties pertaining to child nutrition.

This article examines the performance of the National Rural Employment Guarantee programme since its launch in mid-2005. It first provides a summary of progress in certain areas and then highlights specific weaknesses. Finally, it describes the challenges that lie ahead and suggests how these can be overcome.

Waste water fed fisheries are a common feature in different parts of the world. Yet not all work as efficiently as those operating at East Calcutta Wetland for more than 70 years now. The objective of this study is to unravel the reason for the markedly greater efficiency of the Bheris in fish production compared to other water bodies like rain water ponds or sewage fed fish ponds elsewhere.

On June 13 when Dr GD Agrawal, the eminent 76-year-old environmental scientist started a fast unto death to protest indiscriminate dam building on the Bhagirathi Ganga river, many wondered whether his gesture would be in vain. The government, by and large, turns a deaf ear to such protests. Two groups, who could not be more unlike each other, took up the cause. The Alumni Association of IIT Kanpur and the All India Association of Sadhus met the Union Government and lobbied with the state government of Uttarakhand. And, surprisingly, Dr Agrawal scored a major victory.

A creative partnership between a farmer and a scientist has resulted in the creation of a disease tolerant bee strain that promises to revive bee-keeping in south Karnataka, Goa and Kerala. The bee strain is tolerant to the dreadedviral disease, Thai Sac Brood (TSB). The bees are also much more productive and focused in producing honey. Bee-keeping in south India began flagging in 1992. TSB struck that year. It first hit the Koynadu bees in the Dakshina Kannada district of Karnataka. In the span of two years, the virus wiped out entire colonies of bees in many parts of southern India.

The value of grasses to mankind has been recognized since very early times. The Poaceae are one of the largest family of flowering plants, comprising some 10,000 species under approximately 896 genera. Intensive and extensive survey over the last 7 years on the grass flora, family Poaceae of North-western Rajasthan has yielded uncrecorded seven grasses genera from this region.

India has history of programmes for conservation of soil and water resources by adopting in situ moisture conservation and increased irrigation through tank and aquifer based water harvesting. This article gives an indication of the potential of the watershed programme.

Epidemiologists find molecular clues to air pollution's impact on youngsters.