-The Economic Times Nobody has ever accused former Bihar chief minister Lalu Prasad Yadav of number crunching. All his life he has milked cows and caste without ever needing to count. Yet, he is all set to lead a protest march in Patna on July 13 seeking the publication of caste data in the socio-economic caste census. If the other big Yadav chieftain, Mulayam Singh Yadav, rakes it up in Uttar...

-The Indian Express The average days of employment provided per household, too, fell to 40.01 from 45.97 in 2013-14 and 46.20 in 2012-13. From Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s public barbs against its being a “living proof” of 60 years of Congress misrule, to a proposal now for extending the annual work entitlement to 150 days in drought-affected areas, the BJP-led government’s disposition towards the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Act (MGNREGA)...

-Livemint.com   Sharp agriculture growth is a necessary factor to beat anti-incumbency The modest price hike in minimum support prices of some crops this week has been lauded as good economics. But the question that will be haunting the government is whether it has done enough to alleviate the distress in rural areas, especially when the Bihar Polls later this year are seen as a litmus test for the rule of the...

-The Telegraph New Delhi: A home ministry helpline offering information on quake-hit Nepal has been swamped by Indian farmers airing their distress, embarrassing a government already under the Opposition's cosh for its "anti-farmer" policies. Compounding the discomfiture, most of the callers are demanding the Rs 15 lakh that Narendra Modi had, during last year's election campaign, promised to deposit in every bank account after retrieving black money from abroad, ministry officials said. "We...

-The Times of India Over 113 million persons were "seeking or available for work", that is, they were unemployed, according to Census 2011 data released today. This huge number made up around 15% of the working age population of about 748 million persons in the 15 to 60 years age group. These unemployed persons were distributed over nearly 70 million families or households. That's about 28% of all households in the...