Drought impacted agricultural production but not farm incomes.  The year 2009-10 was supposedly a bad year for Indian agriculture, given the worst ever monsoon since 1972. This is partly reflected in the 0.2 per cent growth registered by the farm sector (inclusive of forestry and fishing) in real terms, as per the Central Statistical Organisation's latest revised estimates of gross domestic product (GDP) for last fiscal. The virtual stagnation in agricultural output...

In India peasantry is under assault. There is a five-pronged attack on this class and the mighty Indian state is sometimes an active and sometimes a passive abettor. The first point of attack is from the corporate sector. The corporate sector is in a land grab mode. Though not justified, one could understand their urge to get land for industry and real estate purposes. Not that they are causing aggressive...

Funding commitments for water and sanitation declined as a share of overall development aid over the past decade despite strong evidence that making the two services available to communities could lower health-care costs, raise school attendance and improve productivity, according to a new United Nations report released today. “Neglecting sanitation and drinking water is a strike against progress,” said Maria Neira, UN World Health Organization’s (WHO) director of public health...

If recent indicators are anything to go by – the failure to keep food prices down, the proposed national food security Act, the failure to ensure even minimum wages to construction workers at projects for the upcoming Commonwealth Games in New Delhi, to recount a few – it seems the country has given up even the pretence of caring about its children or their crippling, unbudging state of malnutrition. Leaders,...

A meticulously researched book by A. Vaidyanathan, Agricultural Growth in India: Role of Technology, Incentives and Institutions, is an illuminating scholarly work. Thinking about it one realizes the dismal and declining state of Indian agriculture and the poor governance at both Central and state government levels that has brought it to this sorry pass. A valuable compendium of data and analysis of Indian agriculture since Independence, it is a valuable...