-The Indian Express Advancing rights of women farmers can revolutionise the rural ecosystem The stereotypical image of an Indian farmer is a mustachioed man, clad in a white dhoti with farming tools in hand. The reality is the Indian agricultural landscape is fast being feminised. Already, women constitute close to 65 per cent of all agricultural workers. An even greater share, 74 per cent of the rural workforce, is female. Despite their...

-Livemint.com Unlike the dhoti-clad, topi-wearing quintessential ‘kisan’, the new Indian farmer is vocal and tech-savvy New Delhi: In the winter of 1988 when the feisty farmer leader from Uttar Pradesh, Mahendra Singh Tikait, laid siege to Delhi with thousands of cultivators and their cattle literally creating a mess of the boat club lawns, agriculture’s share in India’s gross domestic product (GDP) was about 30%. About three decades later, the farm sector’s share in...

-CaravanMagazine.in In mid 2011, Diane Coffey and Dean Spears, both visiting researchers at Economics and Planning Unit of Indian Statistical Institute in Delhi and also assistant professors at the University of Texas at Austin, moved to Sitapur, a district in Uttar Pradesh, to conduct a study on poor early-life health and process of stunting among many Indian children. While Coffey attempted to understand the challenges of raising a baby in the...

-The Indian Express Government has an opportunity to enhance use of social audit to monitor schemes In contrast to its rhetoric, the current government’s record on transparency, accountability, and citizen participation has been uninspiring. Even essential laws such as the Lok Pal and the Whistle Blower Protection Act are yet to be operationalised. However, recent developments on social audits, the conduct of which actually finds a place in the BJP’s 2014...

-The Indian Express As per data being examined by the committee, the minimum wages paid to agricultural workers are significantly higher than MGNREGA wages in Karnataka, Punjab, Jharkhand, Uttarakhand, West Bengal, Mizoram, and Andaman and the Nicobar Islands. THE COMMITTEE for revision of wages paid under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Generation Act (MGNREGA) has found that minimum agricultural wages are higher than MGNREGA wages in 15 states. An upward revision...