-Hindustan Times The Congress chief said the central government barely gave a four-hour notice of the lockdown, thus denying workers and migrant labourers the opportunity to return to their homes. Congress president Sonia Gandhi on Monday attacked the government for charging train tickets from migrant labourers going back to their homes and announced that her party will bear the cost for the rail travel of all such workers stranded due to the...

-Vikalp.ind.in The unplanned countrywide COVID-19 lockdown has resulted in widespread distress to both principal classes among the rural population namely the peasants and agricultural workers. Peasants suffered in the first place from crop losses due to unplanned lockdown induced delay in harvesting of mechanised crops. Apart from this an additional problem for peasants was the elevated fluctuation in prices (fall in nominal prices more often than not) of both crops and...

-The Indian Express The problems were flagged by personnel from Civil Lines police station, which surveyed two shelters at Majnu ka Tilla and the posh Civil Lines. More than 15 shelter homes were assessed by the police. New Delhi: “Fans not working and no power back-up; sanitisation of toilets rarely done; most migrants want to leave as their families cannot survive; rude behaviour of civil defence staff; food quality not good; no...

-The Indian Express According to sources, the National Agricultural Cooperative Marketing Federation of India Ltd (NAFED), which comes under administrative control of the Agriculture Ministry, has been tasked with ensuring supply of pulses from the buffer stocks it maintains. Announced as part of the COVID-19 relief package about a month ago, free pulses — 1 kg per family — to beneficiaries of the National Food Security Act (NFSA) are yet to reach...

-The Indian Express The first thing to understand is that, even before the Covid-19 induced global lockdown, crude oil prices had been falling over the past few months. US oil markets created history on Monday when prices of West Texas Intermediate (WTI), the best quality of crude oil in the world, fell to “minus” $40.32 a barrel in New York. Not only is this the lowest crude oil price ever known —...