This video, brought to our attention by NGO Post, highlights a few great grassroots innovations. My personal favorite is the modified scooter as I believe it could be scaled up substantially. Check out the video below. [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/v/m_ho7xhgWV8&color1=0x006699&color2=0x54abd6&border=1&hl=en]

Slated to be held in Pune, this conference intends to be a meetup of many if not all of the major VC firms in India. The conference is held in Pune in order to focus on startups and ventures happening outside the borders of the major cities like Mumbai or Delhi. Why a VC/PE event [...]

Headlines: Indians free to settle in any part of country, says SC Reacting to Raj Thackeray’s statements on north Indians, the SC said that such a tendency is leading to Balkanization of the country should be curbed with an iron hand. Don’t Ban the Ban Unless the government, people and media scale up measures to [...]

From VC Circle: This could be the first venture capital investment in an organic farming business. Mumbai-based venture capital firm Nexus India Capital has made an undisclosed investment in organic farming company Suminter India Organics Pvt. Ltd. This is an interesting investment as one does not normally associate VC funding with farming. Suminter, however, attracted [...]

Headlines from around the block: What policies can inspire men? What policies can inspire men to end violence against women? This was the topic of a conference held in New Delhi, recently. The discussion hoped to begin a dialogue on masculinities itself, writes Deepti Priya Mehrotra…. At least for now, FM won’t hike waiver size [...]

From Pro Poor: Oxfam seeks outstanding leaders and experienced change managers to build and lead the newly integrated Oxfam India. The organisation will be drawn from six existing organisations working in India, Oxfam India, Oxfam GB, Oxfam Novib, Oxfam Australia, Oxfam Hong Kong and Intermon Oxfam (Spain) who have been operating in India for as [...]

From ProPoor: Over the past twenty-six years AEAI’s operations have spread over 12 states and 3 Union Territories in India in partnership with Civil Society Organizations and through directly implemented projects. With a staff of approximately 100 people (plus approximately 400 indirectly employed by AEAI on projects), AEAI has been working in the education sector [...]

The Center for Media Studies recently published a Transparency Review through its Journal of Transparency Studies, which gauges the overall impact of the Indian Right to Information Act (RTI). The review is critical in its assessment of the effectiveness and extent of impact of the RTI Act. A summary of the concerns cited, courtesy of [...]

As mentioned in a previous post, land ownership is a critical factor in determining social and economic status in rural communities. This is especially true of the dalit community, who, for the most part, don’t own their own land, and must work for meager wages as majdoors (labourers) on other people’s land. For women, in [...]

Atanu Dey writes on his blog an interesting economic analysis for the reason behind the continuing practice of farmers committing suicide. He likens the phenomenon to that of a parent repeatedly tying his child’s shoe only for it to become untied again. He had correctly identified the superficial problem: kid running around with untied shoelaces [...]