NHAI chairman Raghav Chandra talks about steps taken by the highway authority to speed up highway construction projects, improve maintenance of highways and make them safer and more user friendly.

READ: "Our development spending has gone up by more than 50%"

Imagine a scenario where a doctor knows all about the patient’s health even before being bombarded with a litany of health woes. In the not too distant future, this is going to happen in India when an electronic health record will be maintained for every Indian. The government is planning to make a digital repository of medical history of everyone as it wants to ensure an ‘accessible, affordable and high quality’ healthcare. The initiative is in line with the global shift towards electronic health system – wherein each hospital department is computerised and networked and has a central database of patient records

READ: Coming soon: electronic health record of every citizen

The National Food Security Act (NFSA) hopes to address this lacuna. It assures food security for nearly two-thirds of India’s over 120-crore people. But the way it is implemented leaves much to be desired. For example, authorities are yet to ensure that all the poor are identified and then food grain is disbursed to them.

READ: Listen to the rumble in poor’s stomach
 

The Shayara Bano case has placed the Muslim personal law under the judicial scanner yet again. The supreme court is set to examine triple talaq, polygamy and other discriminatory practices against women on the touchstone of the fundamental rights guaranteed under the constitution.
Though there have been petitions in the past pointing to the need for reform, Shayara’s petition has upped the ante by questioning the discriminatory practices as onslaught on her constitutionally-guaranteed rights which the court was bound to protect. With the revolt from within against the Shariyat-based system, it might not be easy for orthodox groups to cut short the debate by justifying personal law pointing to the rights of minorities or freedom of religion.

READ: Fundamental rights vs fundamentalism
 

Pushpa Rawat comes across as a girl next door until you get to know her and her work better. Rawat makes documentary films, but not just any. It is the unusual style of her films that makes this 28-year-old woman from Ghaziabad, Uttar Pradesh, stand out. Her journey so far, however, has not been a cakewalk.

READ: Documenting her way to filmmaking