Declared by the United Nations, the International Day of Persons with Disabilities has been celebrated on December 3, each year, since 1992INDIA has a disabled population of 2.68 crore, as identified by the 2011 census. Fourteen additional conditions were recognised in the 2016 Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act (RPD Act) as against only seven recognised earlier. However, age-related disability is not counted for.

THE very day, December 11, when the Indian finance ministry spuriously claimed a robust recovery in the post-pandemic Indian economy, newspapers carried news of an acceleration in the US inflation rate. The inflation rate in November 2021 over November of the preceding year had been 6.8 per cent in the US, which was higher than the corresponding rate in any month over the previous 40 years; in particular, petrol prices had increased in November 2021 by 58 per cent, which was the highest for any month since 1980.

TWO recent developments have drawn our attention to the urgent need to advance towards sustainable agricultural production. The first is the worsening state of food security in the last decade, as reported recently by the Global Hunger Index 2021 and the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) report, titled The State of Food Security and Nutrition in the World 2021. Food security, notes the Global Hunger Index report, “is under assault on multiple fronts.

CPI(M)  Polit Bureau has issued the following statement on December 11THE Polit Bureau of the CPI(M) strongly condemns the extremely objectionable statement made by the chief minister of Haryana, Manohar Lal Khattar, yesterday.

THE two day virtual Democracy Summit organised by the United States (December 9-10) began with Joe Biden’s admission that democracy is on a decline in the US along with various other countries. Apart from this candid admission, there is no effort made to look into the reasons for this decline and own up responsibility. Of course one cannot expect it, because the very idea of the summit stems from the purpose ‘to act’ and export their flawed model of democracy, ‘push back on authoritarianism, fight corruption, promote and protect human rights’.