-The Economic Times The world is no stranger to farm debt crises like the one India is seeing today. Back in the 1980s, the Canadian parliament enacted a law to stop foreclosures on farm debt, after prices collapsed and interest rates jumped to as high as 24%. The law was in force for a dozen-odd years. It identified insolvent farmers, facilitated agreements between the borrowers and lenders, and helped some farmers move...
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What Ails CAG, and What Can Be Done? -BP Mathur
-Centre for Financial Accountability blog The institution of Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) in India is patterned on the British model. In Britain, The Exchequer & Audit Department Act of 1866 created the office of CAG with a view to strengthen democracy and exercise parliamentary control over national finances. The office of CAG came into being, thanks to the missionary zeal of William Gladstone who was Finance Minister at the time...
More »Why the farmer suicide debate is counter-productive to understanding India's agrarian crisis? -Roshan Kishore
-Hindustan Times In the discourse on agriculture, for instance, farmer suicides are cited as the biggest proof of the agrarian crisis in the country by a large section. India’s political economy discourse is often a prisoner of the dictum that when there is no theory, there is a conspiracy theory. Corruption, rather than an accentuated cyclical shock after the global financial crisis, combined with the poor governance structures in Indian...
More »Powering agriculture via solar feeders -Ashwin Gambhir & Shantanu Dixit
-The Hindu Business Line They not only provide a reliable supply of electricity, but will also help reduce the subsidy outgo of States Two-thirds of the total irrigated area in India uses groundwater pumping, powered by more than two crore electric and 75 lakh diesel pumps. Access to groundwater depends on reliable and affordable electricity supply. This is an important issue as it concerns livelihoods of the rural poor and food security...
More »Loan waiver not a solution to farm distress: NITI Aayog
-PTI NEW DELHI: Joining the debate on farm loan waivers, government think-tank Niti Aayog on Wednesday said such a move helps only a fraction of farmers and is no solution to mitigate agrarian distress. Congress chief Rahul Gandhi has been pressing the government on the issue, saying he will not let Prime Minister Narendra Modi sleep until a loan waiver is given to all farmers. "Farm loan waiver is not a solution...
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