-The Times of India Anticipating what farmers support could mean to Samajwadi Party in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections, the Akhilesh government doled out sops worth Rs 5,432.37 crore for agriculture and allied activities to benefit the group. Chief minister Akhilesh Yadav also reiterated his government's commitment to scrap the old land acquisition policy and come up with a farmer friendly version soon. Stating that loans were a stress that haunted a...

-Reuters SUPALI: Two years ago, Vilas Yelmar took out a 200,000 rupee ($3,610) bank loan to develop a small grape orchard in a dusty hamlet southeast of Mumbai. The bank has repeatedly asked for the loan to be repaid, but Yelmar, whose annual income has risen to 2 million rupees, has spent the money on a new sport utility vehicle and a lavish family wedding. He is one of an increasing number...

Forty-eight thousand farmers, members of twelve hundred co-operative credit societies in Kolhapur district, are up in arms against the National Bank of Agriculture and Rural Development (Nabard) which has asked the Kolhapur district central co-operative bank (KDCC) to recover loans that have already been waived under the union government’s loan waiver scheme four years ago. In a rally held on Saturday, the farmers decided to resort to a massive agitation against...

As children, we were taught to say before our meals, “Annadaata sukhi bhava.” It was a thanksgiving to God for sending the farmer to make food for us and may God bless him. Today, the farmer is helpless. He has no God to go to. Farmer suicides are the tip of the iceberg. The future of agriculture, or lack of it, is staring us in the face. Periodical doles like loan waivers...

-The Telegraph Former chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee today blamed Mamata Banerjee’s recent expressions of intolerance towards critics on her “lack of self-confidence”. He described as “paglamo (madness)” the new government’s curbs on co-operative banks’ loan recovery processes, saying it would “destroy” such banking systems. Asked during a TV interview about his successor’s frequent admonitions to the Opposition to keep mum and allow the new government to work, Bhattacharjee said: “It’s not just the...