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The International Union Against TB and Lung Disease (The Union) is hopeful that India would agree to participate in the second stage of the ambitious STREAM trials for the shortened Multi-Drug resistant (MDR)-TB Regimen. According to I.D. Rusen, Senior Vice President (research and Development) who leads the TREAT-TB Initiative and coordinates STREAM clinical trials for shortened regimens going on since 2010. The Union is in talks with the Indian government on the issue and is hopeful that India would agree to participate in the trials.

India has the largest burden of TB and MDR-TB in the world, and according to the Global Tuberculosis Report 2015, there were an estimated 220,000 TB-related deaths in India in 2014 – marginally lesser than 240,000 deaths reported in 2013. The number of patients living with TB had also declined from 2.6 million in 2013 to 2.5 million in 2014. However, the new cases increased in the same period from 2.1 million to 2.2 million. As per the World Health Organisation, there were 480,000 new MDR-TB in 2014 globally. Only a quarter of these cases are detected and treated, and of the reported MDR-TB patients treated only 50% are treated successfully. The current standard treatment regimen for MDR-Tb lasts up to 24 months and requires frequent injections, which pose a significant burden both on patients and for the health systems tasked with administering treatment. Permanent hearing loss is a serious side effect of the injected medicines used to treat MDR-TB.

“”The Union strongly believes that a more accessible and tolerable treatment for MDR-TB was urgently needed. Experience from a pilot programme in Bangladesh utilizing a nine-month treatment regimen demonstrated impressive outcome,”” Dr Rusen adds. Results of the Phase-1 trial of Bangladesh Project with nine-month treatment regimen, which was a pilot, have shown as overall success rate of 87.9% with a cure rate of 82.5% and only 5.25 death rate. Updated trials showed a success rate of 84.5% with a cure rate of 82.1%. the updated trials had 515 patients.

Further evaluation was conducted on 1,000 patients in West African countries on a modified Bangladesh regimen. The nine West African countries are Benin, Burkina Faso, Burudi, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Cote d’Ivoire, Democratic Republic of Congo, Niger and Rwanda.   An interim analysis of 408 patients in this evaluation demonstrated a success rate of 82.1%. STREAM trial is among the ambitious randomized controlled trial going on at present. In STREAM stage -1, the Bangladesh regimen is compared to the locally used WHO regimen in the participating countries.

Stage-1 trials sites for STREAM were Addis Ababa in Ethiopia, Ulan Bataar in Mongolia, Ho Chi Minh in Vietnam and Sizure, Durban and Pietermartizburg in South Africa.  So far, 424 patients have been enrolled for the trial and the final patient follow-up will be done in the last quarter of 2017 and the results are expected in early 2018. After extensive discussion between the study team, the local investigators and other experts it was agreed that additional regimen would be evaluated which would be a fully oral 9-month regimen and a 6-month simplified regimen. Both include the latest TB drug—bedaquiline.

The first patient was enrolled for STREAM Stage-2 in March this year and so far 10 patients have been enrolled. The size of the patients is likely to be 1155 with the recruitment patient to be completed by middle of 2018. The first patient follow-up is scheduled for early 2021 and the initial end point results are expected to come by the middle of 2030. The project is funded by USAID, DFID, MRC, AFD and bedaquiline provided by Janssen Pharmaceuticals, developers of the new drug.”

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hagman”” alt=””hagman”” />THE HANGMAN’S JOURNAL mixes fact with fiction along with tracing the innermost thoughts of a man who chose being a hangman in the early 1940s for the prison authorities in the Kingdom of Travancore and, after independence the states of Kerala and Tamil Nadu. For three decades after the courts had passed a death sentence it was left to Janardhanan Pillai as the ‘aratcher’ or the hangman to put the condemned man to death, swiftly and clinically. Each time he returned from the gallows Pillai told himself that it would be the last time. But he went back a hundred and seventeen times.

Authored by Shashi Warrier the book goes into the mind of a man struggling to come to terms with his dharma, his conscience and his shame. It sheds light on the innermost feelings of the hangman. It is a narrative about the goings on inside Pillai’s head who believes his existence and that of his family depends on death. In the epilogue Pillai admits candidly “”I have done something that I never thought I could do. I have written a book. Here it is in these notebooks that you (Warrier) gave me. Here also is the pen you gave me: I return it because I am not going to write another book. I wrote what I had to. I opened many doors in my mind, and closed a few, and laid a few ghosts to rest. As you see the book is not concluded. I do not know how to end it. It is for you to do so. I only know that at this moment I feel free, peaceful and I want this feeling to last.””

They call it the drop which snaps the life of a condemned person. The warders have a little table for it, to tell you what distance the condemned man must fall with the noose around his neck, for him to die cleanly. Experts explain that the person must fall just enough to gather sufficient momentum for the rope to break his neck. The British worked it out as a rule of thumb. However, no hangman worth his salt needs the table or a weighing scale, or a measuring tape. He can guess the weight of the man to within five pounds, and then work out the length of the drop to within an inch.

The hangman lived some 400 Km away in the neighbouring state of Tamil Nadu and the Warrier being in Kerala decided to meet him. He telephones a woman to inform her if the situation required then he would like her to join him later which she did. When he reached the hangman’s house he was informed that Pillai had died some two weeks back. Pillai’s wife asked her son to hand over a packet to the author as her late husband had desired. These were seven notebooks in which the Hangman had penned down his feelings and thoughts.

Pillai found it difficult to answer the first question that was posed to him: “”If 117 people you hanged could hear you today, what would you tell them?”” Starting with the heart of the matter the hangman was foxed. “”Ask me something else now. I’ll have to think about it,”” he observed initially. Pillai was also worried that if the author twisted anything he had said and put it in his book it would reflect on him and his sons. Even though trusting a stranger was doubly difficult, the hangman decided to take his chances.

The author and the woman from the publishers who spoke Tamil helped translate whatever Pillai had to say to the questions put to him. Anyhow it was agreed that the hangman would write his story in Tamil for which the notebooks and pen were made available to Pillai. Warrier asked the hangman not to throw away any scrap of paper as it might not be of value to him but might be useful to the former.

It did not matter in the old days because the hangman was the king’s hatchet man. May be two hundred years ago the hangman came from a family of handpicked men, loyal to the death, willing to obey the king’s most ridiculous command without question. They killed without compunction, and one life more or less did not matter to them. But Pillai insisted he was “”no hatchet man. Every life mattered to me. I am of peasant blood, of a family of farmers and tillers of the land, taught over generations to nurture life rather than take it away. The king was my master until independence. I had no choice, really, for I don’t want anybody else to be damned as I have been. I have borne the guilt too long. If what I have written is treason, let them do what they will. I have nothing left that they can take.””

The original grant that the hangman’s family received was some sixty acres of tax free land. The king took no revenue from it. This aside there was more land — fields of paddy. And there was uncultivated land on which cashews grew wild. Along with the grant of land came money: seventeen Rupees a month. The clan grew rich. By decree they became janmis, landed gentry. They had wealth and servants. Every now and then they got a message directly from the king, so regardless of their caste, which was not the highest, they had the grudging respect of everyone in the area.

Since the clan followed the matrilineal system, the right was inherited not by the son of the hangman but his son-in-law, the husband of his eldest daughter, and so on. So they began to look for someone who would do the hangman’s job for them. They found his father, a distant cousin of theirs, close enough to be given the job. He took it because he must have known hunger, and one of the perks of the job was a grant of three large sacks of paddy, each about 85 Kg, from each of the two annual harvests. This supplemented by the allowance that father got for each hanging, saw them through the worst years. But there was never quite enough.

The weight of Pillai’s executions, the weight of the pain of killing at least one man who had done no real wrong, all these burdened his mind. He could not eat and sleep came rarely. He could not go back to his friends, or whatever he had considered normal before Warrier came. There was a distance between him and his wife Chellammal but somehow she did not seem to mind. “”I began to understand how I had changed. After I started on the book I hardly noticed anything. My vision had shifted from the fields outside to those inside my mind, and I still l had no idea what I would find there. I did not know what I was looking for.””

Pillai finally discovered that he was no longer the aratchar. The king’s privy purse had been abolished. With the abolition of the purse his job could come to an end. It is likely that he will have to hang no more. The emptiness persisted, and the thought came again, “”you’ve written enough: stop. Without opening them I held the notebooks I had grown so close to in these few months and felt only a great relief. Death was at the core of it. How could I have killed? How could I atone? The confusion grew, for all the truths I had learnt seemed to have been washed away as if in a flood.”” The book is thought provoking and an unforgettable tale.

TR

(T R Ramachandran is a senior journalist and commentator.)
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The All India Network of Sex Workers (AINSW) has suggested inclusion of representatives from sex workers and transgender communities in the District Anti-Trafficking Committees as proposed in the Trafficking of Persons (Prevention, Protection and Rehabilitation) Bill, 2016. Trafficking of Person’s (Prevention, Protection & Rehabilitation) Bill, 2016 has been proposed to prevent trafficking of persons and to provide protection and rehabilitation to the victims of trafficking so as to create legal, social and economic environment against trafficking of persons. However the Bill should clearly demonstrate the legal and social connotations of the words ‘trafficking’ and ‘sex work’.

Under Chapter II of the Bill, where clauses concerning District Anti-Trafficking Committee has been discussed, alongside District Magistrate, District Judge and representative from DLSA there should be a representative from the sex workers organization as well for better representation. Similarly, at the State Anti-Trafficking Committee representation of neither sex workers nor transgender community has been thought about.

In a statement issued by Kusum, president of AINSW has said that Self Regulatory Board (SRB) and its success stands testimony to the fact that it has been an exemplary model in prevention of trafficking in sex trade, hence our suggestions would be to implement a similar model at local & district level which can work in tandem with District and State Anti-Trafficking Committee. Supreme Court Panel recommended similar suggestions. AINSW and its partner can highly be obliged to produce their services to develop this model to prevent trafficking in Sex Work.

As Under Chapter VI, specifications of Protection Homes and Special Homes have been mentioned, but our opinion is that no more than 1 week of shelter in Protection homes and a maximum of 3 months in Special homes should be provided, Ms Kusum has said. Post such shelter facility vocational and skill development training opportunities maybe facilitated when victims of trafficking can reside with her family (children, in law) and be engaged in other occupations of their choice.   

Chapter VII focuses on rehabilitation and social integration. But there is no clear cut definition anywhere of the term ‘sex work’ and how it is different from trafficking asks Geeta Dutta, General Secretary of AINSW. Those women who are by choice in this profession of sex work should be adequately safeguarded, legally and socially protected against adverse situations, harassment and violence of any sort, she added.

“”We are in absolute support of protection of identity and confidentiality of social or electronic media disclosure of such victims of trafficking as mentioned in Chapter IX, Clause 15.

Those involved in Special Courts, Judges and lawyers should be provided adequate orientation program involving representatives from sex workers and transgender community so that they are in a position to differentiate between sex workers and trafficked victims. Also, in case of Special Public Prosecutor similar orientation program may be arranged, Dr Jana, Chief Advisor of AINSW added.

One who is forcefully kept in any house or brothel is in a different position legally, who should be rescued and legal intervention is of paramount significance in such a case but any such woman or a group of women who by their choice reside in a house or a brothel as a collective of sex workers should be legally protected against any kind of harassment or exploitation, also law should clarify their legal status as opposed to brothel owners.  They may be a part of any Cooperative or Self Help Group to form a collective so as to safeguard their rights as social individuals and they could negotiate in police led harassment and with clients effectively.

The Bill should clearly state that sex work by choice is a profession and any act of trafficking is an illegal step.”

After the two-day National Executive of the party in Allahabad on June 12 and 13, is the BJP viewing Kairana as an opportunity for polarisation in next year’s assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh akin to what the communal frenzy in Muzaffarnagar did in the 2014 general elections? The BJP managed to win a mind boggling 71 seats out of the total 80 seats in the Lok Sabha from the country’s most populous state. With its allies winning two, the NDA finished with a record tally of 73 which catapulted them to power at the centre with a majority of 282 seats on its own and along with its allies the NDA crossed the rubicon of 300 and finished with a comfortable 340 in the 543-member House of the People.

It might be too early to make those assumptions at this juncture as the assembly elections are still about eight months away. The question is will Kairana do the trick for BJP in the upcoming Uttar Pradesh assembly elections. Even though it is a dangerous game, the gambit is clearly to keep the Kairana issue alive to influence the electorate. The alleged exodus of Hindu families from Kairana has given the saffron brigade a handle to indulge in divisive politics in the run up to the most crucial assembly elections in UP.

It is now beyond the shadow of reasonable doubt that BJP MP Hukum Singh representing Kairana in Western UP and neighbouring Kandhla district in Shamli let his imagination go wild. The MP allegedly released a list of 350 odd families from Muslim dominated Kairana township polarising of Hindus having been compelled to bolt from there. However, many of those who figured in the list were either still in residence or had left much earlier in search of better prospects. There is evidence that many of those who moved out of Kairana and Kandhla did so not because of communalism but crime.

Both towns are in the grip of powerful and violent criminal gangs which have had a free run of the area. Fact finding teams irrespective of their political affiliation, have been to that region under the threat of such groups, particuarly one run by Kukem Kala engaged in extortion. After the MP’s list was found to be mischievous exaggeration, Hukum Singh himself backtracked claiming that the migration was essentially a law and order problem. The lie of Kairana exodus exacerbated social tensions in the region which is yet to recover from the communal carnage of 2013.

While Prime Minister Narendra Modi has exhorted the BJP rank and file at the party’s Naational Executive to focus on development, others in the party want to exploit Kairana as a campaign plank. Senior police officers posted in Western UP admit that though some of the Hindu families in Kairana had decided to migrate from the area, their decision was guided more by deterioration of law and order than any other reason.

For several years UP has been witnessing some of the worst communal clashes. Unchecked crime affects business and working communities in UP’s mofussil towns has long been associated with Samajwadi party rule. The Akhilesh Yadav government has done little to change this perception. The larger anxiety remains. In regions with mixed populations, the consequences of painting a largely crime related phenomenon with a broad communal brush has the portends of lethal consequences.

The BJP remains unrelenting from its position of a “”Hindu exodus”” and is now projecting the Kairana issue as a forced migration of residents due to fear induced by the police appeasement of criminals belonging to the minority community. The BJP team which visited Kairana has submitted its report to UP BJP president Keshav Prasad Maurya on Thursday. The report will be handed over to BJP president Amit Shah to be submitted to UP Governor Ram Naik. Maurya said the party was preparing a road map to further intensify the issue across the state. What is scary is that BJP activists are looking for more Kairanas in the state.

In its preliminary report submitted to the government, the district administration has listed lack of industries and health and educational centres in Kairana as the reason for economic migration. Reports suggest that along with Hindus, Muslims have also migrated from Kairana in search of jobs. Kairana is not very far from Muzaffarnagar. Historically it has been Muslim dominated.

Meanwhile, BSP supremo and former UP chief minister Mayawati put up a brave front when a heavyweight and and backward castes leader Swami Prasad Maurya quit the party as he felt “”suffocated”” in it. He accused Mayawati with auctioning party tickets for the upcoming polls. He is also the leader of the opposition in the UP assembly. There is speculation that he might join the Samajwadi party.

Expectedly, Mayawati lashed out at Maurya saying she would have expelled him anyway from her party. She said he wanted tickets for his son and daughter for contesting the assembly elections. There are bound to be some queer twists and turns in the run up to the elections as BJP would like break the common refrain that it essentially a party of upper castes. It is in this context that the Lotus party wants to make a determined pitch for the support of the backward castes. That is why it has chosen a backward caste leader in Maurya as the BJP chief in Uttar Pradesh.

This town which has a history of amity between the Hindus and Muslims, Kairana is known for its Hindustani classical music. It is the birthplace of the Kairana Gharana whose practioners include Pandit Bhimsen Joshi, Begum Akhtar, Gangubhai Hangal, Roshan Ara Begum among several others.

(T R Ramachandran is a senior journalist and commentator. Views are personal.)

“Having become a nominated BJP Rajya Sabha member recently, the maverick Subramanian Swamy can be more than a handful as a trouble shooter. He manages to remain in the limelight and revels in particularly targeting the dynastic Nehru-Gandhi family of Congress president Sonia Gandhi, her son and party vice president Rahul Gandhi along with daughter Priyanka and her husband Robert Vadra. This eminently suits the BJP’s top leadership who have no love lost for the country’s first political family.Ironically, he has been a friend of Sonia Gandhi and a bitter enemy of the BJP in the past. He has the dubious distinction of pulling down the Atal Behari Vajpayee government in 1999 when he brought Tamil Nadu chief minister J Jayalalithaa and Sonia Gandhi together over coffee. His rabid anti-Congressism has secured him a seat in the Rajya Sabha recently at the end of April.When the irrepressible Swamy gets close to anyone as evidenced with Jayalalithaa not very long back, her trouble began with cases of corruption being launched against her. It is an entirely different matter that he has suddenly gone quiet on that front perhaps on account of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Amma being close friends.Dr Swamy is associated with a lobby in the saffron brigade gunning for Arun Jaitley’s head since he became the union Finance minister in the Modi government. It is, therefore, not surprising when Congress leader Digvijaya Singh is thinking aloud if Swamy, an economist to boot, is angling for the Finance portfolio in union council of ministers even if that is unlikely to happen.Mr. Modi is not Vajpayee and is unlikely to bat an eyelid in sidelining Swamy or sending him to the cooler if he becomes overambitious or even remotely poses a threat to the present regime. A case in point is how BJP elder statesman and former Deputy Prime Minister L K Advani as well as Murli Manohar Joshi being summarily sidelined and pushed to a corner as “”marg darshak”” or revered advisors.Dr. Swamy may have attacked Reserve Bank of India Governor Raghuram Rajan demanding his dismissal and the Modi government looked the other way without coming to his defence. Even before Rajan took up the the job of RBI Governor during the Congress led UPA regime, he had made it abundantly clear he was here for the short haul as he desired returning to academia. He resigned in keeping with his plans and will call it quits on fourth of September when his three-year-term ends.Dr. Swamy then launched an attack against NDA government’s chief economic advisor Arvind Subramanian from “”Washington DC””. Jaitley wasted no time in backing the CEA rebuffing Swamy suitably. That is not going to deter Swamy who has made his intentions clear that he would soon be demanding the head of 27 others holding senior positions in the government who are not serving the interests of the country. Simply put, Swamy believes these officers are not in sync with the policies of the Modi government. There is unlikely to be a dull moment for the NDA government with Swamy working overtime to haul over the coals those who are inimical to the Modi government.Swamy reacted quickly saying it did not matter what Jaitley says as he is directly in touch with the Prime Minister and BJP president Amit Shah when required. Be that as it may, the quickfire announcements made on June 20 is aimed at lessening the blow of Rajan’s resignation which was not unexpected in the wake of the personal attacks against him by the Sangh Parivar. This is the second opening up exercise of the economy since November last year.Foreign investors are interested in India is evident with a 23 per cent surge in FDI touching a record $ 55 billion. Many in the corporate sector and opposition parties felt Rajan deserved a second term. Rajan had made it clear at the very beginning that he was not in this country for the long haul.Nobody is indispensable in public life and the need of the hour is to find a successor able to retain the credibility that Rajan had brought to the RBI. As the world integrates financial instability is a huge challenge. Before bidding adieu he hopes to complete “”unfinished tasks”” on hand.  His achievements are manifold. Inflation has halved. His role in stabilising the Rupee in September 2013 when the Indian economy faced a 2001 like foreign exchange crisis was noteworthy.The long overdue cleaning up of bank balance sheets has got underway. Foreign exchange reserves have shot up to help this country deal with global shocks. The significance of what has been done in the last three years during his stewardship of the central bank cannot be undermined. The Modi government’s uneasiness stems from its monetary policy which it believes is an important reason for the economy not taking off as fast as it could have. The slow pace of interest rate cuts was another irritant for the Modi regime. Although RBI cut rates by 1.5 percentage points since last year, private investment is just not happening. The RBI forcing others to acknowledge had loans rather than dabbling in giving away more good money has led to record losses since 2015 across the public sector banking system. This has been a source of friction between the government and Rajan.His exit is another instance of brilliance being pushed over by mediocrity. Lip service in undertaking reforms is one thing but actually getting down to the cleansing job is bound to create a delicate situation for the government. FDI investors had found India to be the best destination globally. One wonders if that will continue to remain so when Rajan bids adieu to the RBI in September. Among his tasks is making public the list of wilful defaulters. “”The list is being drawn up and we hope to put it on our website where everyone can see it,”” he said in a television interview.He cautioned that the RBI would have to be careful about the names on the list because not all loan defaulters are wilful or involved in any sort of malfeasance. “”Business had hit a wall because of the economic downturn and unable to pay back loans would not be named and shamed.””The RBI has flagged the challenges for sustaining India’s economic momentum: global growth is uneven and struggling to gain traction, world trade is floundering for want of demand, the US is weighed down by contracting industrial activity as exports, deflationary pressures are building in Japan, and the slowdown in China shows no signs of reversing. Besides if Britain leaves the European Union there is a real risk of “”some turmoil in the financial markets.””Eventually the central bank can only do so much in the end. Amid all this there is talk of increasing the term of RBI Governors from the existing three years to at least five years if not more. The argument is if the Lok Sabha has a five year term as also the the government at the centre and those in the states, then the RBI Governor’s term should also be for at least five years.In this a pointer to the Modi government facing a certain talent crunch inhibiting it from delivering its development goals even after completing two years in office. There is discernible frustration in the government as the the much touted slogan of “”aache din aane wale hai”” seems like a mirage even after it completed two years in office.(T R Ramachandran is a senior journalist and commentator. Views are personal.)“

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The United Nation has announced Zubaida Bai from India as one of the 10 Local SDG Pioneers for Safe and Healthy Birth. The announcement was made at the UN Global Compact Leaders Summit 2016 in New York. Zubaida Bai, founder and CEO of ayzh, was recognized for her efforts that align with Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 3 on Good Health and Well Being. Over 600 nominations were received from 100 countries between February and April 2016.

Launched in 2016 as part of the UN Global Compact’s Making Global Goals Local Business campaign, the Local SDG Pioneers programme seeks out individuals who are demonstrating how the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) can enable business to unlock economic, social, and environmental gains for the world. The 17 Sustainable Development Goals of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development – adopted by world leaders in September 2015 at an historic UN Summit – officially came into force on 1 January 2016. Over the next fifteen years with these new goals that universally apply to all, countries will mobilize efforts to end all forms of poverty, fight inequalities and tackle climate change, while ensuring that no one is left behind.

“Each of the 2016 Local SDG Pioneers exemplifies how business can be a force for good in addressing the challenges we face as a global society,” said Lise Kingo, UN Global Compact Executive Director. “Ms. Bai is dedicated to assuring healthcare for women in India. She has developed an affordable product and successful business model that is making a critical difference in the lives of mothers, children, and families across her country. She is a pioneer for safe and healthy birth.”

The Pioneers are made up of entrepreneurs who are championing sustainability through their business models and change makers who are mobilizing the business community broadly to take action in support of the SDGs. A Pioneers Selection Group, comprised of experts from the UN, academia, civil society and the private sector, ranked the nominees based on a set of criteria, resulting in the ten 2016 Global Compact Local SDG Pioneers. In the years to come, the Global Compact’s Pioneers programme will become a vital part of the organization’s priority to make global goals local business.

“I’m honored to be a part of the inaugural class of 2016 Local SDG Pioneers and wish to thank the UN Global Compact for this prestigious recognition,” said Ms. Bai. “The SDGs provide strategic roadmap for improving the health and wellbeing of mothers and their newborns. We are excited to advance the role of the private sector in achieving the Sustainable Development goals as they relate to the entire reproductive, maternal, newborn, child and adolescent health (RMNCAH) continuum. We also hope to impact SDG 5 (gender equality), 9 (resilient infrastructure), and 17 (partnerships for the goals) with our work.”

Ms. Bai founded ayzh in India, based on the belief that every woman has the right to a safe birth as well as affordable and dignified healthcare. Since 2010, Zubaida has attracted clients and strategic partners from around the world, putting over 240,000 kits out into the market, all while putting health products into the hands of the women who need them the most.

The UN Global Compact Leaders Summit 2016 is a two-day gathering of the private sector, UN, Government and civil society to jump-start action to achieve the UN Sustainable Development Goals by 2030. Together, over 800 leaders from around the world are gathered in New York to identify how to unleash the business activities, thinking, and innovation required for a new era of sustainability.

The UN Global Compact is the world’s largest corporate sustainability initiative, calling on companies to align strategies and operations with universal principles on human rights, labour, environment and anti-corruption, and take actions that advance societal goals. In India, over 300 companies and non-business organization have joined the initiative, and the Global Compact Network India has supported their efforts to advance sustainable business practices since 2003.

Ayzh (pronounced ‘eyes’) is a social enterprise that develops and distributes low-cost, appropriate technology designed to meet the unique needs of women and health institutions in low-resource settings, targeting the time around childbirth. Through the sale of our customizable “kit style” products (namely our janma Clean Birth Kit), our sustainable and scalable model increases availability and access to proven health commodities, while providing economic opportunity to local Indian women who package and assemble our products. Our expanding product suite addresses the critical continuum of maternal health, namely newborn care, post partum care, and menstrual hygiene. ayzh has a diverse, dynamic, and passionate management team with expertise and synergy, who naturally foster integrated innovation across the fields of global health, business, and technology.”

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The issue of child trafficking is complex and not limited to just the legal aspect but also relates to social and economic issues, was the verdict of a three member jury on child trafficking. The verdict came out following a public hearing on child trafficking organized by child rights group HAQ in collaboration with several other civil society groups working on the issue.

After hearing the depositions and reading the stories of those who were unable to depose due to emotionalreasons, the jury observed that the issue of child trafficking has to be tackled at its root and there has to be an environment created to prevent trafficking by empowering urban/rural communities, creating awareness and providing education to families and children. Moreover, providing opportunities of employment and security within the community in collaboration with local government, NGOs and police is the need of the hour.

The jury comprising Lushin Dubey, Siddharth Luthra and Om Thanvi said the next stage is of community response which must be calibrated with necessary and relevant education and training to act both as a preventive measure, and to enable adequate rehabilitation measures and acceptance of children as victims of crime needing special care within the community. This requires proactive change at both the government and social level.

Importantly, the jury felt that the all the concerned stakeholders, including NGOs and particularly survivors, should be properly consulted before the Trafficking of Persons (Prevention, Protection and Rehabilitation) Bill 2016, which has been put out by the Ministry of Women and Child Development for inviting suggestions, is given a final shape.

There are different categories of trafficking — whether through coercion, kidnapping or with the consent of parents– all of which need to be dealt with in their distinct forms. The legal framework also needs to be reviewed to ensure complete coverage. This review must happen on a 5/10 yearly basis by viewing the impact on the menace, it said.

Reporting of crime is an issue which has to be dealt with by the law enforcement agencies and perhaps units akin to economic crime/ crime against women (CAW) and children cell which carry out pre-investigative enquiries. This would ensure that from the time of reporting, even if an FIR is to be deferred, the police machinery begins their work immediately.

Lack of coordination between state police agencies, anti-human trafficking units (AHTUs) and other agencies tasked with child care has to be legislatively and administratively streamlined, and the investigation has to be specialized, made efficacious and standardized procedures need to be adopted put throughout the country to avoid state-wise variations in procedure which despite the presence of central substantive and procedural laws, the jury said.

Recommending special prosecution efforts to be taken keeping in view the nature of crime, the jury said the process needs to be expedited and there should be timely review by the High Court.Investigation must be comprehensive as it often has inter-state ramifications and cannot be limited to one or the other aspect alone merely because of the convenience of the police. Integrity of police investigation and efforts need to be provided for and improved. A review mechanism should be created within each state since police is a state subject, the jury members said.

On post investigation and prosecution, the jury said there have to adequate standardized measures for rehabilitation and compensation, including medical treatment, to ensure that all victims are provided proper relief and assistance at state cost for their rehabilitation first within the community and then in the society at large. The victims should also be able to access their right to education, including vocational training, as part of the rehabilitation programme.”

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The Ministry of Women and Child Development has announced several facilities and incentives to the Anganwadi Workers to improve their conditions of service. The government has waived off the Anganwadi Workers share of Rs 80 for Anganwadi Karyakartri Bima Yojana. The Anganwadi Workers have been provided an insurance cover under Anganwadi Karyakartri Bima Yojana. The annual premium for this is Rs.280 out of which Rs.100 is paid by the Central Government, Rs.100 is paid by the Ministry of Finance and Rs.80 which is supposed to be paid by the Anganwadi Workers. This has been waived off.

The Anganwadi Worker is also provided 180 days of maternity leave. She is also sanctioned two saris as uniform every year. Scholarship benefit is also provided to the Anganwadi Workers @ Rs. 300 per quarter for their children studying in classes 9th to 12th. In order to improve their career prospects, the Ministry of Women and Child Development has ordered that 50% of the posts of Supervisors should be reserved for the Anganwadi Workers. Anganwadi Workers with 10 years of experience are eligible for appointment as Supervisor against this 50% quota.”

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The Union Cabinet, chaired by the Prime Minister Narendra Modi, has decided to withdraw the Drugs and Cosmetics (Amendment) Bill, 2013, which had been introduced in the Rajya Sabha onprevious government on August 29, 2013. Instead, the government has now decided to comprehensively review the existing law to facilitate the ease of doing business and substantially enhance the quality and efficacy of pharmaceutical products. The Ministry of Health and Family Welfare will soon notify separate rules under the existing Act for regulating medical devices; and bring out a separate legislation for regulating medical devices and drugs and cosmetics.

While, after extensive discussions with all stakeholders, the draft rules for regulating medical devices have been prepared and will be draft notified shortly, work on drafting the new legislation has also commenced. The Amendment Bill had been examined by the Standing Committee of Parliament which had made a number of recommendations for changing the provisions of the Bill.India is one of the largest manufacturers of pharmaceutical products in the world. The annual production of such products is in excess of Rs. 2 lakh crore. Out of this, over 55% is exported to over 200 countries/economies of the world including the developed countries. As such, the pharmaceutical sector in India plays a vital role in managing the public health in large number countries at a substantially lower cost.The regulatory framework for ensuring the quality, safety and efficacy of medical products including the medicines, medical devices, in-vitro medical devices, stem cells, regenerative medicines, and clinical trial/investigation is provided for in the Drugs and Cosmetics Act, 1940.

The Cabinet has, keeping in view the role of the sector in managing public health, decided that it will not be appropriate to carry out further amendments in the present Act especially as newer areas of biological, stem cells and regenerative medicines, medical devices and clinical trial/investigation cannot be effectively regulated under the existing law.In order to leverage the comparative cost advantage, the demographic dividend and the advantage in information technology, the Indian medical products sector is poised for exponential growth in the near future and it would besides meeting the domestic demand, has the potential to become an international hub for manufacturing these products and attracting investment in the sector.”

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The Communist Party of India (Marxist’s) loss in the recent West Bengal Assembly elections has claimed its first victim with the senior leader from Haryana, Jagmati Sangwan resigning from the primary membership of the party to register her protest against the party’s decision to ally with the Congress in the State.

However, the party claimed that Jagmati Sangwan had been `expelled’ for gross indiscipline. This announcement was made at the ongoing Central Committee meeting of the CPI (M) in New Delhi. Ms Sangwan, member of the Central Committee, who had been associated with the party since 1968, had boycotted the Central Committee meeting as a mark of protest against the decision of the West Bengal government to tie up with the Congress in the just concluded Assembly election even though the Central Committee was against this decision.

An emotional Ms Sangwan, who was the face of the All India Democratic Women’s Association (AIDWA) in Haryana, told reporters that she announced her decision to the party. She said she had opposed the West Bengal unit’s decision and made her opposition clear. In a statement issued at the conclusion of the three day meeting, the CPI (M) said that the electoral tactics adopted in West Bengal were not in consonance with the Central Committee decision not to have an alliance or understanding with the Congress.

Other than saluting its voters, the statement said the West Bengal elections were held in very difficult conditions for the CPI (M) and the Left Front. During the course of last five years, the terror unleashed by the Trinamool Congress CPI (M) had, even before the campaign began, claimed the lives of 176 comrades apart from internally displacing 60,000 families of CPI(M) members, and sympathizers. Pointing out that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) had come to power in Assam for the first time and made substantial gains in Kerala, and West Bengal, the statement said the party had undertaken a very aggressive campaign in Kerala and “”mounted serious post-poll violence against the CPI(M). Overall, the Congress suffered a setback in this round of elections.

On its win in Kerala, the party said the CPI(M)-led LDF had taken a strong stand against corporatization, corruption and communalism. The LDF victory in the Assembly elections is recognition for the policy of building up Left and democratic alternative to the BJP and the Congress. Describing its performance in Tamil Nadu as disappointing, the party said the six-party alliance could not win any seat and that a major feature of the Tamil Nadu elections had been the use of money power in a big with both the AIADK and DMK distributing cash to the voters in most of the constituencies on an unprecendented scale.

Suggesting that in Tamil Nadu and Assam, where the alliance could not win even a single seat, the emphasis should be on building the independent strength of the party through class and mass struggles, and taking steps to rally all the Left and democratic forces, the statement said the Left parties in Assam had appealed to the voters to oust the Congress from power, defeat the BJP and elect the Left candidates for strengthening the unity of the people and ensuring all-round development of the State.”