-The Business Standard   How a law to conserve groundwater led to a better paid and better organised migrant workforce Ludhiana: For some years now, Punjab's fields have lain fallow through the searing dry heat of May; but come June's steamy humidity, small bands of lithe, slender men from Bihar fan out across the waterlogged paddy fields, transplanting rice saplings with fluid efficiency. Bihar's paddy planters have frequented Punjab since the 1960s when rice...

-The Telegraph   Supaul: A college graduate hailing from a Farmers' family, Anil Kumar Yadav (32) roamed around in Delhi and Mumbai in search of a job only to return empty-handed, about three years ago. The very idea of getting engaged in the family's traditional vocation was "nightmarish" to him. Anil, a resident of Samda Chowk village under Basantpur block of Supaul district, around 350km northeast of Patna, today owns a spanking motorcycle,...

-PTI   Patna: Union Agriculture Minister Radha Mohan Singh on Saturday said the central government was working on a new crop insurance scheme to help Farmers tackle flood, drought and plant diseases in a better manner. He said it will be launched soon across the country, as the existing scheme has not proved to be beneficial to the Farmers. Details will be unveiled during the Budget session of the Parliament, he added. Singh also...

Punjab, which was known to be the land of agricultural prosperity during the 1970s and 1980s thanks to the Green Revolution, has increasingly witnessed its small and marginal Farmers being pushed out of the agricultural sector. Based on a survey (conducted in 2012-13) of 288 Farmers from 12 villages—2 villages from each of the 6 districts that represent various agro-climatic zones—the study by Sukhpal Singh and Shruti Bhogal reveals that...

-The Hindu   Government policies, vagaries of weather drive them to the wall Anantpur (Andhra Pradesh): The agriculture scenario in the Anantapur district might well be on the path to irreversible damage if unchecked and acted upon with immediate urgency. Over 15 per cent of Farmers are leaving agriculture altogether, if the statistics available with the Agriculture Department are to be extrapolated to the ground realities and understood in that context. Speaking to The...