India’s health sector presents an opportunity to transition to clean energy.

A recent report by India’s NITI Aayog discusses various operating models of India’s not-for-profit hospitals to highlight the crucial services they provide and the challenges they face. As the country recovers from another wave of the Covid-19 pandemic, India’s overstretched and inadequate health infrastructure, which largely remained in the margins of conversations on development, has taken centre stage in the past year. And the stark differences in the quality and cost of care between private healthcare facilities and the government and not-for-profit hospitals are very evident.

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Data from the annual national Rural Health Statistics (RHS) have long informed us of the challenges that the government faces in filling rural vacancies at Primary Health Centres (PHCs) or ensuring trained medical professionals remain in their jobs in remote parts of the country. What is often missed is how the not-for-profit health sector had stepped in to fill this gap. The NITI Aayog report acknowledges these services by this sector and highlights prominent challenges it faces.

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These challenges mirror those faced by the government hospitals — the severe lack of infrastructure and the constraints in expanding it, often exacerbated by insufficient funding. There is also the challenge of getting trained medical professionals to take up rural postings, leaving many jobs unfilled. This is an extremely important and timely report. We add one more challenge– the lack of reliable and affordable electricity required to power existing and future rural healthcare facilities...

These gaps present a challenge, but they also provide an opportunity to attempt a paradigm shift in building health infrastructure and provisioning power supply. Both would directly impact the quality of care, its reach, and the livelihoods this would create.

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According to the RHS 2019-20, nearly a quarter of the 35,980 sanctioned positions for doctors in rural Primary Health Centres (PHCs) nationwide are unfilled. The statistics for Community Health Centres (CHCs) that provide specialised medical care are even starker. The data reveals that 63.3% of the sanctioned posts of specialists at CHCs are vacant. They comprise surgeons, obstetricians & gynaecologists, physicians and paediatricians.

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More importantly, of the existing about 155,000 sub-centres, nearly one-third (44,000) and 1,000 PHCs out of about 25,000 in rural areas still operate without electricity supply.

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Healthcare professionals point to multiple hardships, from low salaries to working in remote locations that lack basic facilities such as reliable electricity and water supply, motorable roads, and network connectivity. Often, rural healthcare facilities lack sophisticated diagnostic and surgical tools and medical equipment.

Also, a common refrain is the limited infrastructure for their accommodation, the lack of options for good schools and daycare support for their children. Cumulatively, these issues deter medical staff from moving to these remote locations...

Reliable electricity is crucial for every aspect of a health facility. It is required to run equipment for diagnostics, sterilisation, medical procedures, water supply, and store vaccines and other medications. Beyond the hospital building, reliable electricity is required to power staff quarters — not just lights and fans, but also household and kitchen appliances, charging mobile phones and internet connectivity. The efficient functioning of a health facility is underpinned by the quality of infrastructure provided to its staff, which is only possible when there is affordable and reliable power supply for all their needs..

Reliable access to energy, therefore, plays a critical role in creating a virtuous cycle. 24x7 power supply in hospitals enables upgradation of facilities to provide advanced healthcare services and for longer operating hours. This results in more patients being able to access much needed healthcare facilities, reinforcing the need for more doctors and nurses. In turn, this could possibly attract more financing for the health facility to improve its infrastructure.

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Reliable access to energy, therefore, plays a critical role in creating a virtuous cycle. 24x7 power supply in hospitals enables upgradation of facilities to provide advanced healthcare services and for longer operating hours. This results in more patients being able to access much needed healthcare facilities, reinforcing the need for more doctors and nurses. In turn, this could possibly attract more financing for the health facility to improve its infrastructure.

Reliable access to energy, therefore, plays a critical role in creating a virtuous cycle. 24x7 power supply in hospitals enables upgradation of facilities to provide advanced healthcare services and for longer operating hours. This results in more patients being able to access much needed healthcare facilities, reinforcing the need for more doctors and nurses. In turn, this could possibly attract more financing for the health facility to improve its infrastructure.

Additionally, increased budgetary allocations towards enhancing access and quality of all health services are needed. This requires a holistic view of creating a climate-resilient and energy-efficient healthcare infrastructure. This could be achieved by assessing healthcare facility energy requirements, retrofitting energy-efficient medical equipment and ensuring the provisioning of power through cost-effective renewable energy resources.

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Transitioning to renewable energy comes with multiple benefits. They can be deployed quickly, and will immediately enhance the reliability of the power supply. It will also bring savings on power bills and cut down on diesel expenses required for standby generators. These accrued savings could be ploughed back into enhancing healthcare service delivery.

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The NITI Aayog report has spotlighted a sector that has thousands of unsung warriors who have striven to put the care of others first, particularly in the least visible and remote regions of India. It is time to ensure lessons from this sector on resource management inspire the private and government healthcare facilities to attempt a sustainable transition to clean energy.

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To ensure justice, a caste census is essential. Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe.

An Indian women’s hockey team player, who happened to be Dalit, had to face caste slurs, and her family had to confront upper-caste harassment after the team’s loss in the Tokyo Olympics. This reminded me of novelist Farahat Zama’s apt comment, “You can take an Indian out of the caste system, but you cannot take the caste system out of an Indian.”.

The caste system is India’s nemesis and has severely restricted the country’s ability to realise its immense potential and become a great nation in science, technology, knowledge, art, sport and economic prosperity. Many public intellectuals would like to believe that they have been “de-casted” — meaning they have got rid of all of the markers of caste identity. But whether we acknowledge it or not, caste has been at the forefront of our social existence and regulates our lives — from birth to death, customs, rituals, housing, professions, development planning, and even voting preferences..

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Studies suggest that 94% of marriages are endogamous; 90% of menial jobs are performed by the deprived castes, whereas this figure is reversed in white-collar jobs. This abysmal lack of caste diversity, especially at the decision-making levels in various sectors — the media, the judiciary, higher education, bureaucracy or the corporate sector — is weakening these institutions and their performance.

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A tale of four presidents, Afghanistan, and India. Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe.

“It was never expected that we will have victory in Afghanistan,” Taliban leader Mullah Baradar said after his return to Kabul. He was certainly not alone in expressing surprise at the sudden collapse of the Afghan government and the Taliban’s complete takeover..

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In the aftermath, there is plenty of blame to go around. Officials in several regional capitals played an active role in facilitating the Taliban’s return to power. Many Afghans feel betrayed by their own country’s erstwhile leadership, with good reason. Others in the international community arguably did not do enough. But there is no escaping the fact that significant failures lay with successive United States (US) leaders for the execution of the Afghanistan war, the doomed reconciliation process, and the chaotic withdrawal.

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The US intervention in Afghanistan followed the devastating 9/11 attacks by al-Qaeda, which struck the nerve centres of the US military and financial markets. Under George W Bush, the US easily ousted the Taliban government in Afghanistan, which had sheltered al-Qaeda’s leadership. But the Bush administration was also worried about a large-scale military commitment and maintained only a small military footprint in Afghanistan at the outset. The US intervention, therefore, involved aerial bombardment, the extensive use of special operations forces, and local alliances on the ground..

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Taliban’s rhetoric indicates the limits of Islamist project and jihadism Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe

The Taliban’s conquest of Afghanistan has reignited many fears. Will the group cast off its past of flagrant barbarity? As their fighters breached Kabul and their top leaders homed in on the presidential palace amid a tearful recitation of the Quran’s 110th chapter, I was transported back to a world I had visited earlier.

I had had a professional opportunity to embed with Pakistani forces in the Taliban holdouts in the Khyber Pakhtunkwa province in 2012. My interests didn’t boil down to geopolitical questions about how spectacularly Pakistan’s forces cleared many of these hideouts that they and the Americans had helped to prop up in the first place. I instead pivoted towards understanding my own faith in all its dimensions..

The Taliban have sought to convey a less dogmatic position on governance this time, vowing to avoid reprisal attacks and respect people’s basic rights. It’s early days still to tell whether this is a ruse for global acceptance or proof of reform.

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But irrespective of how it pans out, the Taliban’s apparent turning a new leaf highlights the limits of Islamism, and in particular, its most potent tool — jihadism. Many ordinary people are still confused about what Islam is, and isn’t. A simple acceptance of monotheism is the sine qua non of Islam, the faith. On the other hand, Islamism seeks to build more structures drawn from the normative aspects of the faith. Islamism and, by extension, jihadism are primarily a response to colonialism, imperialism and modernity itself. To that extent, Islam is a necessary, but not sufficient, condition for violent modern-day jihad..

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The effects of violent jihad have been egregiously felt across the modern world. This is not to suggest that non-Islamic sources of war have been any less lethal. The Fat Man and Little Boy obliterated at least 220,000 lives in Hiroshima and Nagasaki in singular strikes, nearly the same number of people killed in all of modern jihad’s history.

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Jihad under Prophet Mohammed had ground rules. Combatants could take on only combatants, unless there was an explicit “command” from God. Mutilation and killing of women, children, old and the infirm were prohibited. Suicide is prohibited in Islam. Regardless of what is the right jihad, one finds compelling reasons why all Islamist organisations must shun jihad. The nature of problems faced by Muslims today are different from those 1,400 years ago, when Prophet Mohammed blazed through the sands of Badr or Al Khandiq following “direct divine sanction” to battle his enemies..

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Islam is not compatible with modernity, defined by the ever-enlarging scope of universal freedoms, rights and equality. No religion is. But modernity’s underlying values are not repugnant to classical Islam. Concepts such as equality and democracy are not alien to Islamic aspirations (“White men are not superior to Black men and Black men are not superior to White men”, the Prophet said in his last sermon). Zakat is one of the earliest forms of economic redistribution known to humankind..

The Taliban has rejected the possibility of a democratic State. This rejection is un-Islamic. Islamic societies have been governed by institutions called shoora, an inflection of the word “mashwara” (discussion) from the Prophet’s time, and well before English philosopher John Stuart Mill famously described democracy as “government by discussion”.

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By 2030, 60% of the world’s Muslims will continue to live in developing or least-developed economies and encounter problems wrought by unbridled capitalism, discrimination and neo-liberalism, rather than political subjugation. Fixing these problems will require mastery over modern economics and sciences, understanding of complex modern institutions such as the World Trade Organization and the United Nations.

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The Taliban has no idea about how to claim the $9 billion of foreign reserves held by Afghanistan, for instance, mostly in assets abroad. But they will need that money soon. They can’t blow up human beings to access those cash piles. Muslims make up about 22% of the world’s population. But over a third of the world’s two-billion poor people live in Muslim countries. The Quran enjoins Muslims to proactively work to change their fortunes. This, today, means assertion of claims through a language of rights, rather than violent extremism.

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Air India flight with 78 people evacuated from Afghanistan to land in Delhi soon Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri

As many as 78 people, including 25 Indian nationals, are being brought to New Delhi from Tajikistan's Dushanbe in a special Air India flight on Tuesday, according to the ministry of external affairs (MEA). They were flown out of Taliban-controlled Kabul to Dushanbe in an aircraft of the Indian Air Force (IAF) a day before. "Helping in the safe return from Afghanistan. AI 1956 enroute to Delhi from Dushanbe carrying 78 passengers, including 25 Indian nationals. Evacuees were flown in from Kabul on an @IAF_MCC aircraft," Arindam Bagchi, the MEA spokesperson, tweeted.

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Bagchi also posted a short clip of passengers on board the flight shouting Sikh slogans like Waheguru Ka Khalsa, Waheguru Ki Fateh. 

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Three copies of the Guru Granth Sahib and 75 people, including 46 Afghan Sikhs and Hindus, will also be evacuated from Afghanistan on an IAF plane. “Three Sri Guru Granth Sahib Ji are being escorted to the IAF aircraft at Kabul Airport. Forty-six Afghan Hindus and Sikhs along with stranded Indian nationals are blessed to return on the same flight,” Union minister Hardeep Singh Puri tweeted.

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Puneet Singh Chandhok, president of the Indian World Forum, said nearly 200 more Afghan Sikhs and Hindus are still stranded in Afghanistan. “These people have taken shelter at the Karte Parwan Gurdwara in Kabul, which is close to the airport,” he told news agency PTI.

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Not a single euro’: EU talks tough on Taliban’s promise of peace, women's rights Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri

The European Union has neither recognised the Taliban nor it is holding talks with the militant, EU Commission president Ursula von der Leyen said on Saturday. Addressing a joint press conference alongside Spanish President Pedro Sanchez and EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell, von der Leyen put strict conditions for releasing the one billion euros set aside for development said for the next seven years.

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So let me be very clear on development aid. The 1 billion euros in EU funds set aside for development aid for the next seven years is tied to strict conditions: respect for human rights, good treatment of minorities, and respect for the rights of women and girls, just to name a few,” said the EU Commission president.

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She said the situation in Afghanistan is still very unclear and unpredictable, raising apprehensions about the Taliban’s promise of peace and inclusivity. Referring to the reports of women being turned away from their workplace and people being hunted down for their past work, the top EU official said not a “single euro of development aid can go to a regime that denies women and girls their full freedoms and rights to education and careers.”

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We may well hear the Taliban's words, but we will measure them above all by their deeds and their actions,” she added..

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The Taliban’s months-long offensive to topple the Afghan government led by Ashraf Ghani resulted in the displacement of hundreds of thousands of people. After the Taliban completed a lightning takeover of Afghanistan on Sunday, the Kabul airport witnessed a chaotic situation as hundreds of desperate Afghans were trying to board military planes flown in by other countries to evacuate their staff and citizens..

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This resettlement of vulnerable people is of utmost importance. It is our moral duty,” Von der Leyen said.

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Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe.She also stressed the need to prevent people from falling into the hands of smugglers and human traffickers. “This means, first, that we must offer legal and safe routes globally, organised by us, the international community, to those who need protection,” she added.

Tamil Nadu extends Covid-19 curbs till September 6, but gives fresh relaxations Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe Shri Radhe

The MK Stalin government in Tamil Nadu extended the overall lockdown-like curbs in the state till 6am on September 6, but also announced certain relaxation. The decision comes after chief minister Stalin held a meeting on the Covid-19 situation on Saturday.

The state government had earlier allowed reopening of schools for Classes 9 and 12 with 50 per cent attendance from September 1. "The schools will work on a rotational basis," the chief minister announced today. Any decision on reopening of schools for Classes 1-8 will be taken after September 15, he added.

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All shops can stay open till 10pm, according to latest orders issued by Tamil Nadu government. Earlier, they were allowed only to remain open till 9pm.

Theatres across Tamil Nadu have been permitted to open with 50 per cent seating capacity from Monday (August 23). Theatre owners have been asked to ensure that all workers are 100% vaccinated.

The beaches too have been allowed to reopen, but the shopkeepers and small traders around the beach area have been asked to get themselves vaccinated.

Zoos and botanical gardens have also been allowed to reopen.

Public buses to Andhra and Karnataka allowed, and have to follow Covid appropriate behaviour.

IT offices can function with 100 per cent workforce.

Swimming pools are still closed for general public, but those being used for purpose of training for competition can open. However, all trainers and trainees above 18 years have been asked to get themselves vaccinated..

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