-DNA India's agriculture sector is thriving and can provide livelihood to millions more. False pictures form the main plank of the political debate on India's agriculture. One is that of the Bharatiya Janata Party and the other of the Congress. The two big political parties in the country agree with each other in believing that farmers and the landless folk in the villages are at the end of the tether, and...

-The Indian Express Government’s insistence on acquisition is rooted in a rush to impose the Gujarat model on the rest of India. The development agenda of the Narendra Modi government implies industrialisation. The BJP’s 2014 mandate was indeed for job creation. The “neo-middle class”, which Modi defined when he was CM of Gujarat as made up of aspiring city dwellers who have just emerged from poverty, supported him more widely than the...

-Hindustan Times London: With the global population expected to touch 9 billion by 2050, food from forests in India and elsewhere have potential to address needs of nutrition and food security at a time when the limits of boosting agricultural production are becoming increasingly clear. A new report produced by an international panel led by Bhaskar Vira, an expert based at the University of Cambridge, says that  despite impressive productivity increases, there...

-The Hindu The State’s recent experience shows that even the worst-governed States can reform their public distribution system and make good use of the National Food Security Act. “In Lalu’s days we had a lal card [BPL card], with Nitish we got coupons, and when Manjhi came we got this new ration card”. This is how Anuj Paswan, a Dalit resident of Tetar village in Gaya district, sees recent changes in Bihar’s...

-ANI Chennai: Indian agriculture is at the cross roads, Dr. M.S. Swaminathan, father of India's first Green Revolution, has warned. Lamenting on the state of Indian farmers, especially farmers with small land-holdings, Dr. Swaminathan said, "The market economy certainly is not friendly to small farmers. WTO regulations are also hindrance. Even in the United States which is the heartland of the free market economy, farmers are insulated from market shocks through heavy...