From Our Own Correspondent

Voting with your husband, unsolved murders, cooking on the centre spot, shamans and mud. Kate Adie introduces correspondents' stories. Melissa Van Der Klugt is in India's most populous state, Uttar Pradesh, where a giant exercise in democracy has been taking place but where illiteracy and political ignorance remains high. Peter Walker, in Malawi, comes across worrying signs that the police are ready to sweep murder under the carpet. In China, they're spending a fortune on football but will it bring world cup glory, as the President wants. Richard Dove has his doubts. In Peru, Simon Parker comes face to face with an Andean Shaman for the first time and hears concerns that too many tourists are more interested in bragging rights and profile pictures than in the sacred heritage of Machu Picchu. And in Vermont, winter is fading and they're on the cusp of spring - it's time to get dirty, says Christine Finn, because it's Mud Season.