-TheWire.in Examples from Jharkhand, Karnataka and other places make a strong case for kitchen gardens in more parts of the country. Pali Biruli lives in Gondamara, a tribal village in Saraikela district of Jharkhand. When we stepped into the courtyard of her home to have a glass of water, the beauty of the surrounding greenery surprised us. Within a small place. she and her family members had managed to grow papaya, mango,...

-Livemint.com Kerala govt’s aim is to build 500 sq. ft houses costing Rs4 lakh each, for which the state has tweaked the centre’s housing programme, the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana Bengaluru: Building free houses for all the homeless in Kerala -- more than half-a-million at last count -- is one of the flagship projects of the Communist government. A cabinet meeting held on Tuesday night offers glimpses into the project’s nitty-gritty. The aim...

-Down to Earth Corporate India gets indirect subsidy equivalent to 60 per cent of government expenditure on Rural Areas A recent analysis has revealed a shocking injustice being done consistently to rural India by the government with corporates getting subsidies at its expense. The Inclusive Media for Change, a New Delhi-based non-profit has analysed the last seven Union Budgets. It has found that indirect subsidy, termed as “tax expenditure” that was given...

-Livemint.com To stabilize crop prices and make them remunerative, the Swaminathan Commission proposed significant improvements in the implementation of MSPs Across the country, farmers are furious—and rightfully so. Four years ago, they helped bring the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) to power, believing Narendra Modi’s claims that they would no longer suffer official neglect. But since then, conditions in agriculture have got worse. Earlier problems have worsened as farm incomes have been squeezed...

-The Hindu UDAY scheme: Tamil Nadu ranked lowest on performance power distribution companies Chennai:  UDAY review finds little progress made in smart metering. Tamil Nadu has been ranked lowest in terms of State distribution companies’ quarterly performance as of December 2017, post joining the Centre’s Ujwal DISCOM Assurance Yojana (UDAY). The State had joined the scheme over a year ago. The scheme, covering 31 States and Union Territories, emphasises both financial turnaround and...