There is some or other news almost every day about autonomous vehicles, also popularly known as “driverless” or self-driving cars. Either some or other company is announcing ever-earlier dates when it plans to introduce autonomous vehicles into the market, or some new city or region, usually in the US or Europe, or is granting permission for trials of autonomous vehicles.

THE toxic activities of gau raksha samitis that have sprung up all over the country has led to increased attack on not only Muslims but also dalits. This was the pattern in the past, and also the pattern today. Even as the protests against the Una attacks rocked the country, Bajrang Dal targeted dalits in Chikmaglur in Karnataka, the eighth such attack in the last two years. This was followed by the beating of two dalit men in Lucknow for skinning a dead cow.

IT is by now clear that the settled policy framework of the Modi government is to pump in public investment for infrastructure, services, taxes and other incentives for corporates and higher income groups in the belief that this will stimulate further investment especially FDI, wealth creation and GDP growth which will in turn, hopefully and ultimately, trickle down to the less well-off or at least lead to a “feel good” factor.

IN the recent slew of measures aimed at liberalisation of norms for foreign direct investment (FDI), norms for the pharmaceuticals (medicine) sector have been further liberalised. Existing norms allowed for 100 percent FDI in the case of Greenfield projects (projects that involve infusion of FDI to set up a completely new facility) through the automatic route – ie, without prior permission from the government.

THE World Health Organisation (WHO) identifies India as one of the 57 countries with a critically low level of human resources available for healthcare. This would not come as a surprise given the evidence in the country of widespread shortages of skilled health workers of all kind including doctors, nurses and other health workers – in most parts of the country. The shortage of health workers and the attendant poor quality of skills in a large proportion of them is one of the biggest obstacles to the availability of quality healthcare services in India.