Data Point

In this episode, The Hindu Data Team delves into the severe food shortages in Gaza and the ICC’s intervention, analysing the intersection of international law and humanitarian aid. Vignesh Radhakrishnan discusses the war’s humanitarian impact, while Stanly Johny examines the global response to the ICC warrants.

Earlier this month, a Qatar court issued the death sentence to eight former Indian Navy personnel. The former officers were arrested in August of 2022, allegedly for espionage. It’s a case that has brought the issue of Indian’s arrested abroad, back into the forefront. According to the latest data, taken from Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha answers, there are about 9,500 Indians in prisons across 89 countries. Most of these Indian prisoners are in West Asian jails, over 2,000 are in Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. In this episode, The Hindu speaks to Prabhash Ranjan, who teaches at the Faculty of Legal Studies at South Asian University, about what to do, if an Indian national is arrested in another country. Guests: Prabhash Ranjan, Faculty of Legal Studies, South Asian University

On June 24th, the Madras High Court held that homemakers are entitled to an equal share in properties purchased by the husband. The Hindu talks to Shaji Paul Chaly, former Justice of the Kerala High Court, and Ashok G.V., a practising advocate at the Karnataka High Court and Partner at Factum Law, to delve into the ramifications of this ruling. We discuss its potential as a legal precedent and explore whether it can be applied to husbands who are homemakers and working wives.

Doctors and MBBS students from diverse specializations, age groups, and geographies believe that the preparation required and done for the NEET examination, does not actually help or provide any added advantage when they start their MBBS course. In fact, they claim that during the MBBS program, every student starts from the same level. Given this, they also told The Hindu that States, rather than the Centre, should make decisions on how medical entry is conducted, to ensure that the State's medical needs are met-- in line with India's federalist structure. Credit to Sonikka Loganathan and Vignesh Radhakrishnan

Doctors and MBBS students, in various fields of specialisation, across various age-groups, from diverse geographies, say they believe that while common entrance examination for medical seats is a necessity, the coaching industry skewed it in favour of urban and richer students. Unaffordability of quality coaching classes and the luxury that richer students have to drop a year to prepare for the exam, make it increasingly difficult for students from poorer and more rural backgrounds to get a seat, they said. In this episode of Vital Signs, The Hindu Data Team speaks to various stakeholders in the medical field to understand the issues plaguing India's medical education, over the years.

Earlier this month, the Supreme Court passed a ruling that allows the apex court to grant divorce in cases of what it termed irretrievable breakdown of marriage. The decision was made in line with the premises of Article 142.1 of the Constitution which states that complete justice should be done in any cause or matter. There are several grounds for divorce listed in India’s marriage acts, but until now, the irretrievable breakdown of marriage was not one of them. This ruling means that couples, who want to end their marriage without blaming their spouse for something like adultery or abuse, can do so. But this process isn't as simple as it seems. In this episode, The Hindu speaks with Geeta Ramaseshan about how much of an impact this ruling will actually have, and whether it helps empower women to leave unhealthy marriages.

India’s CCTV camera coverage has grown massively and Delhi and Chennai now have more cameras per square mile than cities in China. Generally, the public sentiment is that having CCTV cameras acts as a reassurance, so that in the event of a crime, there is video evidence to rely on. But this has not really resulted in a reduction in crime rates. In this episode, experts discuss the pros, the cons and where we draw the line between surveillance and public safety.

When countries and companies increasingly send satellites and spacecraft into orbit, they face an increasingly pressing problem: a lack of space. Debris from old satellites and other launches are floating around the earth, clogging orbital highways and increasing the risk of collisions with active satellites. Data from 2023 finds there are 13,953 pieces of trackable debris in space, compared to 10,350 spacecrafts or satellites, and 2337 rocket bodies. In today's episode, The Hindu unpacks just how big of a problem space debris is. Experts discuss who is responsible for clean-up efforts, what that process would look like and what the path is moving forward, as our reliance on assets in space increases.

The recently released Annual Status of Education Report 2022, which surveys learning outcomes of school children, revealed continued dips. In southern, central and western states, in particular, learning levels in mathematics dropped further away from what is expected at a certain grade level. As students continue to move to higher grades, with this weak foundation, what impact will this have on them when they go to university, and eventually enter the workforce? The Hindu speaks with experts to understand the long-term impact of this educational crisis.

In this episode, The Hindu speaks to our own Srinivasan Ramani and Vignesh Radhakrishnan about how the data team carries out election coverage. From scraping the data to experimenting with different mapping softwares, and analysing the results in real time, this episode brings you into our newsroom.

On October 30, Luiz Inacio Lula Da Silva, more commonly known as Lula, won Brazil’s nail-biting presidential election. Lula, a leftist populist, ran against incumbent Jair Bolsonaro, a right-wing hardliner, in a deply polarised Brazil. During his campaign, Lula pledged to implement policies to protect the Amazon, which saw widespread destruction under Bolsonaro. In this episode, The Hindu speaks to experts on what incentivised voters to choose Lula, and how important climate change and environmental issues are to the Brazilian people.

In July, The Hindu’s data team published a story that revealed major disparities in the admission rate of PhD candidates from Scheduled Caste, Scheduled Tribe and Other backward classes backgrounds. Data released by the Lok Sabha found that in nine IITs, across India, the acceptance rate for SC/ST/OBC PhD candidates was at or below 8%, despite all of these universities receiving hundreds of applications. This is happening despite having reservations in place. What is going on behind the scenes at India’s top universities and how did this kind of structural and systemic form of discrimination ferment itself into higher education? This is the first episode of a two-part series, examining this caste-based discrimination, and the impact it has.

NCRB data shows that cyber fraud is increasing in non-metropolitan cities. In fact, in the 19 metro cities which have a population above two million, the number of cyber fraud cases recorded is somewhat plateauing. But other cities and towns are seeing a sharp increase in these crimes, recording 9813 cases in 2021, compared to 4194 cases seen in that same year in metro cities. This is happening at a time when people are increasingly relying on the internet for day-to-day activities, including financial transactions. This reliance is also encouraged by the government, through schemes like the Pradhan Mantri Jan Dhan Yojana. But is this creating fertile ground for criminals behind the screen? In this episode, The Hindu discusses what might be causing this rise in non-urban cyber fraud, and how you can protect yourself online.