-Business Standard In absolute numbers, farmer suicides in Haryana and Punjab were less than in Maharashtra, which continued to be Number-1 Punjab, Haryana, Gujarat and Karnataka, which have large tracts under irrigation and have maintained high agricultural production levels, saw a surge in farmer suicides during 2016, as compared to 2015, provisional data showed. This contrasts with the traditional suicide hotbeds of Maharashtra, Telangana and Andhra Pradesh — they saw a fall...

-The Hindu Farming must be treated as a market-based enterprise and made viable on its own terms The week-long farmers’ march which reached Mumbai earlier this month, on the anniversary of Gandhi’s Dandi March of 1930, was unprecedented in many ways. It was mostly silent and disciplined, mostly leaderless, non-disruptive and non-violent, and well organised. It received the sympathy of middle class city dwellers, food and water from bystanders, free medical services...

-PTI "Gujarat's achievements in education and health are not like those in other areas like industrialisation, infrastructure and energy....it lags behind in these two (health and education). I talked about this with the state government," Niti Aayog Vice Chairman Rajiv Kumar said. Gandhinagar: Niti Aayog Vice Chairman Rajiv Kumar on Sunday said that while Gujarat has done very well in industrialisation, it will need to do some catching-up in the health...

-Livemint.com The only way to solve the farmers’ problem is to make entry to other sectors attractive by creating employment opportunities, and to make it easy to exit farming Farmers have a bad romance with the Indian polity. On the one hand, India loves, even worships, these farmers. On the other, Indian policymakers create the most impossible regulatory environment for the agricultural sector, trapping farmers in a low-income, low-productivity occupation. The latest...

-Down to Earth Experts say they have already submitted a document to the ICAR about adopting IFS in north-eastern states India needs to adopt a “well designed” integrated farming system (IFS) to realise Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s vision to double farmers’ income by 2022, observed the scientists and agricultural experts at the ongoing 105th Indian Science Congress in Manipur today (March 19). “The IFS can enhance farmers’ income if we provide a...