Insights

The incidence of children begging on the street has increased a lot during COVID-19. India already has more than 3 lakh child beggars. With schools closed and families desperate for income, thousands of children are being forced into begging. The article urges for immediate actions from the states and NGOs to rescue and rehabilitate these children and also to prevent children from entering or being forced into begging and other forms of exploitation.

Even when the GDP growth rate and employment have fallen dramatically, the Indian government has been reluctant to engage in expansionary fiscal policies. The reasons given against higher fiscal deficit are higher interest rate, inflation and balance of payment crisis. This article argues that these concerns from higher fiscal deficit are not applicable in India currently.

COVID-19 has completely unravelled the prevailing early childhood education (ECE) systems. This article discusses the modes of ECE in India, the impact of this pandemic on it, parental perceptions and finally impresses upon the need to figure out a workable solution to once again begin providing the necessary ECE to children of this age group.

The piece underscores that a fast changing technology and power dynamics of the virtual world pose unique and complex challenges for human rights. This situation demands a comprehensive, strategic and collective response from the rights based civil society organisations (CSOs). The piece discusses different aspects of the virtual world and their implications to human rights along with the way forward.

Interrupted ICDS, NHM, and NNM interventions targeted at addressing undernutrition, and deepening poverty and food insecurity in the face of COIVD-19 pandemic, spell out dire consequences for nutrition. Therefore, the approved budget for nutrition has to be retained to sustain and enhance the interventions and the infrastructure delivering them.

Through an online survey of children who are attending online classes, this article tries to capture their experience of this new arrangement of learning.

While government machinery, both at the national and the state level, are trying to tackle the immediate threat of the pandemic, there are concerns around ensuring proper nutrition for children and pregnant women, especially for the marginalised sections. The article highlights some of these issues and discusses the need for protecting public provisioning in relevant government schemes and programmes which are crucial for nutrition.

The study shows that the reach of the government in health care, across states, is limited, which has made the poor section dependent on the private sector, and that has led to economic impoverishment. It requires a large scale increase in public expenditure on health to make the system battle ready.

Implementation of MGNREGA has suffered due to an inadequate allocation of resources. This was reflected in lower than legal minimum wages, low level of days of employment creation and leaving out a sizable number of households from receiving gainful employment. Allocation of little over Rs. 1 lakh crore is still inadequate to counter the crisis and a higher allocation will not lead to substantial burden on the exchequer.

MHRD is exploring the possibility of reopening schools and for which NCERT is preparing guidelines related to social distancing in schools/classrooms. However, data suggests that the majority of the schools are not equipped to implement such measures and one of the prominent reasons is chronic under-funding in the school education sector.

The stimulus package has not made clear whether or how small farmers will really benefit.

Tax justice and financial transparency are ever more urgent. To start to rebuild an international society worth living after Covid-19 we need a plan that puts human rights at the centre of our response.