Nothing takes one back to one’s childhood than a festival. Chhath Puja brings back memories of mothers, grandmothers, aunts and cousins bustling around preparing for the pujas, cooking and spreading joy and that special buzz.

Almost five months after an unprecedented public outrage over deepening cracks in the Joshimath area in Uttarakhand, a think tank called for better preparedness to come up with an organised disaster management response. Also, it pointed out the lack of transparency of data about the geological conditions in the area. Details here.

A teacher of a government primary school in Varanasi district, doesn’t think twice before visiting the houses of students who are frequently absent. His strategy has paid off as absenteeism has dropped, enrollments have gone up and with that the infrastructure of the school has improved.

Imbibed with the themes of gender, agriculture and folk music, Phool Dei is a harvest festival in Uttarakhand. Its rituals are such that they revolve around the equilibrium between human development and environment. More details here.

Vaping can cause major health issues such as addiction, anxiety, depression, sleeping disorders, exposure to cancer-causing chemicals, chronic bronchitis and lung damage.

Recently, a 16-year-old girl from Dumka, was set on fire by her stalker and killed. A couple of days later, a minor girl who was four months pregnant was found dead and hanging from a tree in Dumka. The Jharkhand Police had launched a mobile application Shakti to help women in distress, but the app is not functioning and few even know of its existence.