Full Coverage: Governance

31.07.2007 The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) have reached a halfway point but little seems to have changed, particularly for women whose lives are most affected by extreme poverty. The MDGs do not deal with the underlying causes for women and girl's poverty which needs to be understood in ways men and women access and control services and resources.

31.07.2007 New Delhi based organisation Centre for Science and Environment (CSE), announces a five-day refresher workshop on how to use the environment to eradicate poverty in rural India, from 19-23 November, 2007 at the Anil Agarwal Green College New Delhi 110062, India.

31.07.2007 Indian state Gujarat, which lies on the west coast, is celebrating a successful school enrollment drive that started five years ago to ensure all children, especially girls, are enrolled in schools. Through community mobilisation in 18,000 Gujarat villages the initiative has met with sizeable success.

31.07.2007 Greenpeace India has released a set of thermograph images of the Mysore Palace as a part of its campaign to phase out inefficient lighting in India to fight climate change. The palace uses approximately 96,000 ordinary light bulbs, which are energy inefficient and replacing them with compact fluroscent lamps (CFLs) can save Rs 41 lakhs and a significant amount of power.

31.07.2007 The tribals of Ranchi, the capital of the east Indian state of Jharkhand are bringing out handwritten newspapers to highlight the problems faced by them and raise issues that are overlooked by major newspapers. Through newspapers they also try to create awareness among people about government welfare programmes.

30.07.2007 The Delhi Police has printed a booklet on Security tips for North East Students /visitors in Delhi and advising them on how to behave well and to blend into the mainstream society of Delhi. But many activists and concerned citizens believe this a violation of human rights.

30.07.2007 Analysis of phone records by the Jan Sangharsh Manch (JSM), an NGO in the western state of India, Gujarat, indicates that top police officials who were responsible for controlling the post-Godhra riots in Gujarat, in 2002, were not at the spot when two worst attacks against the Muslim community took place.

30.07.2007 ActionAid’s Hunger Monitoring project reveals that climate change and oppression in the north Indian state of Uttar Pradesh have worsened hunger and deprivation amongst the population. The study points out significant changes in weather patterns over the last four to five years which has adversely affected farming.

27.07.2007 NEW YORK, Jul 27 (OneWorld) - Calls for increased help from Washington are on the rise as global efforts to tackle the world's burgeoning water and sanitation crisis have largely failed to produce any meaningful results so far.

27.07.2007 South Asia Partnership International (SAPI) is organising the South Asian Regional Conference on Invisible Faces of Violence on Women in Politics: Breaking the Silence, from 18-20 September 2007 at Hotel Soaltee Crown Plaza, Kathmandu, Nepal.

27.07.2007 The cotton has now been dubbed "the killer crop" as continues to take the lives of farmers in the Vidarbha region of western India. High cost of farming and poor returns have taken the lives of nearly 8,000 farmers in four years says activist farmer Kishor Tiwari.

27.07.2007 North-east Sri Lanka goes unserved by both the government and aid agencies as the region remains inaccessible. 30 months after the tsunami even as other parts of the country forge ahead, the north-east lags behind in reconstruction efforts.

27.07.2007 Citizen smart cards are a new revolution that provide a unique citizen number which is centralized in a national register of Indian citizens.It can bring the benefits of e-governance as the use of data warehousing and data mining could also help the government monitor its welfare schemes effectively.

27.07.2007 SAN FRANCISCO, Jul 26 (OneWorld) - Peace advocates in the United States are welcoming a Congressional vote Wednesday that may be a political stepping stone to ending U.S. participation in the war in Iraq.

26.07.2007 The former project manager of SS Norway (Blue Lady) has submitted an evidence which reveals that the toxic ship-for-scrap renamed Blue Lady and currently anchored 4000 feet off Alang coast has radioactive material on board in at least 5500 fire detection points.

26.07.2007 Aborted female foetuses continue to be unearthed from all over India irrespective of regional differences as recent investigations
demonstrate from two economically diverse states - Orissa and
Maharashtra.

26.07.2007 CIVICUS Secretary-General Kumi Naidoo shares his views on "How to address a climate in crisis" at the Andreas Papandreou Foundation. He is deeply concerned about the future of the planet and the coming generations as climate change affects all people and both poor and rich countries.

26.07.2007 The Green Revolution has been a useful response to food insecurity at a certain point in India's history. But the strategy cannot be a permanent one for a country like India. The fact is that intensive agriculture could happen only with high a level of irrigation, with diversity of ecology, rainfall and water table on which India is lacking.

26.07.2007 Pakistan 's Superintendent of Central Prison in the southern port city of Karachi spends sleepless nights trying to figure out how to save the life of 107 inmates - all of who face the death sentence. Human rights organisations in the country chose to remain mum on the issue.

25.07.2007 The Gujarat-based Institute of Rural Management (IRMA) has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Union Ministry for Panchayati Raj to monitor the implementation of the ministry's projects for strengthening grassroots organisations and for implementing self-governance.