society/culture

'Prevented from visiting Kashmir last week, a delegation of activists lashed out at the government for seeking to project a false narrative of “normalcy” in the valley. “If everything is normal, then what is the need for maintaining a clampdown in the valley for two months?” questioned Sandeep Pandey, Ramon Magsaysay Award winner and head of the National Alliance of People’s Movements, a network of grassroots organisations in India, who was a part of the delegation.

'Declaring the indefinite strike by unions of the Telangana State Road Transport Corporation (TSRTC) illegal, chief minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao said more than 50,000 protesting employees will not be taken back into service. Employees of the public road transport body have been on a strike since Saturday morning, demanding the corporation’s merger with the government. Among the other demands were filling various posts and better pay and job security. A call to strike was given after talks with the government failed to make any headway...'

'The Uttar Pradesh government has announced that a fresh enquiry would be ordered into the charges against Gorakhpur’s BRD Medical College paediatrician Kafeel Khan, who was given a ‘clean chit’ by a previous probe committee. The doctor was accused of corruption and medical negligence after the deaths of more than 60 children in August 2017 because of a lack of oxygen supply. However, a probe committee headed by an IAS officer found that the doctor was not culpable for the deaths.

'The Union Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate Change has given in-principle approval for relaxing air pollution standards for coal-fired thermal power plants. The decision was taken on May 17, 2019 in a meeting chaired by the ministry’s joint secretary, Ritesh Kumar Singh... It is noteworthy that before the meeting, the CPCB had sent a monitoring report on seven units of four thermal power plants to the Ministry of Environment on May 2, 2019. The pollution body found that emissions at just two units out of the seven exceeded the 300 mg/Nm³ emission limit.