The glitter of growth has added little sparkle to the lives of many peasants and rural workers. Deprivation, discrimination, and disadvantage dominate the everyday lives of large sections in rural Andhra Pradesh, an important new study*finds.  Village studies highlight features of society that are often overlooked and overshadowed by macro-studies of the economy. A recent study presents extraordinarily rich, unusually detailed and intensely disturbing data on agrarian relations, livelihoods, economic...

With expectations of a record wheat production this year (2009-10), the Union government is upbeat about providing food grains to the Below Poverty Line (BPL) families on a sustained basis under the proposed National Food Security Bill. “Despite the drought caused by (-) 23 per cent rainfall during the kharif season this year, farmers have maintained a production of 170.29 million tonnes of rice and wheat… which calls for satisfaction. With...

Rice procurement has crossed 27 million tonnes in 2009-10, down by about three per cent over the last year's due to low production. Food Corporation of India (FCI), the nodal agency for procurement and distribution of foodgrains, and state agencies had procured 27.93 million tonnes of rice in the corresponding period of the previous marketing year, which runs from October to September. The Centre had procured a record 33.68 million tonnes of...

Though Palakkad district in Kerala, where the Coca Cola plant is situated is considered as the ‘rice bowl of Kerala’, a part of the district falling in the rain shadow region of the Western Ghats is drought prone. Plachimada, where the Hindustan Coca Cola Beverages Private Limited (HCBPL) factory was set up had been classified ‘arable’. The villagers are predominantly landless agricultural labourers with almost 80 percent of the population...

The Central budget of 2010-11 is a further step in the realisation of a vision of India vibrant with the income, wealth, saving, education and the entrepreneurial energy of the top 5-10 per cent of the population and the rest of Indians, serving that minority and surviving as barely literate, malnourished multitude.  With the accession of Rajiv Gandhi to power, a vision began to germinate. That vision was that of...