The idea popped when I was reading this NY Times article on a federally funded program in the US where wireless carriers receive a subsidy to provide people under welfare with a mobile phone and 68 minutes of talk time each month!…

[Story source: Business Standard]

Recently, Business Standard carried three articles under the Smart Cards byline. The articles – “Smart choice, sloppy plan“, “Andhra villagers now have pension on their fingertips“, “From Dhenakal to Bellary” – track the introduction of smart cards…

Editor’s note: In order to more quickly provide our readers with pertinent information, ThinkChange India has created TC-I FundWatch, a regular post that summarizes important investments made by social and traditional venture capital firms that directly affect the lives of…

Saturday afternoon news:

• Social welfare: The Government of Himachal Pradesh is planning to issue separate ration cards to single widows in the state to enable them draw benefits under various state social welfare programmes. (Source: iGovernment)
• Health research: Using supercomputing simulations and lab…

• State weakness report: Brookings Institute ranks India 67th out of 141 states in their new report that measures state weakness based on the criteria of economic, political, security and social welfare.
• Technology: Google released today Voice Search in Hyderbad which enables users to…

Some headlines before you head off to lunch:

• Technology/Connectivity:  
  • Mobile connectivity will be in the hands of millions of new subscribers thanks to BSNL’s $100 million contract to Nortel for supporting GSM network expansion in the southern part of India.  The…

• A new United Nations report, Redefining AIDS in Asia: Crafting an Effective Response, was just released and makes an astonishing prediction: 500,000 peaple could die each year people due to AIDS-related illnesses by 2020. (Source: PSD Blog)
• Another UN report focuses…

The South Asian, a progressive grassroots newspaper, had the following stories today:

• Analyzing the effects of social welfare policies through the lens of the most marginalized — the Musahars
• The subaltern’s skeptical review of human rights and its role as the last…