Agriculture is not just a food producing machine but the backbone of the livelihood of 60 per cent of Indians. The extensive drought spotlights a situation of mass rural deprivation and a mindset that is insensitive to it. But there are some encouraging signs. What should be done to meet the challenge?  There are reports in financial newspapers that the ongoing drought affecting nearly 200 districts in the country may...

  Civil Society activists and assorted rural experts are anxious that soon-to-be-launched Right to Food Bill might slip from its ambitious goal of nutrition security for all to a trite tokenism. The main worry is that cumulative effect of all the clauses, sub-clauses and small print must not stop short of making food available everywhere at all times so that no citizen sleeps hungry. The worry is on many counts. The...

UPA's promised blanket of food security backed by a law could shrink very quickly leaving several crore families out of its cover if the food ministry's proposal on Food Security Act finds favour with the Cabinet. In a note that has left several state governments seething with anger, the food ministry has recommended that the number of families that get subsidised foodgrain under the Food Security Act be reduced to...

  The 2009 drought has once again highlighted the need for farming drought hardy crops such as millets and coarse grains instead of water guzzling paddy and wheat in the country’s water deficient areas. Officially, about 70 per cent of India’s cultivable land is un-irrigated and falls in the country’s most backward dry-lands. It is a proven fact that India’s rich diversity of resilient millet crops are the farmer’s best protection...

Is the government trying to shirk its responsibility of providing a social security net even as it contemplates a right to food act? In a move that could undercut the very logic of UPA’s much-touted right to food Act, the Planning Commission has recommended that the government do away with the public distribution system (PDS) and begin cash-for-food schemes instead. Running counter to the logic of the much successful mid-day meal...