-Mongabay.com * India’s ongoing lockdown to control the spread of coronavirus is threatening the agriculture sector as it overlaps with the time of harvest. * The lockdown has derailed harvest preparation and lack of agricultural labour to help in harvest and restrictions on transportation of produce despite being given waivers as essential services. * Farmer leaders and agriculture experts criticised the relief package announced by the government to aid farmers impacted by the...

-TheWire.in Before it is eradicated, the novel coronavirus can be tamed, but this will require the rapid implementation of an action plan that is humane, rational – and unafraid of the fiscal beancounters. It’s too late. The COVID-19 horse has bolted and closing the barn doors now will not bring it back. Despite Narendra Modi’s all-India lockdown, the number of people testing positive for the virus has risen sharply during the past...

-Livemint.com * A prolonged lockdown will hurt farmers about to harvest the winter crop and the landless living on daily wages * Continued disruption in the food supply chain will eventually hit consumers if prices vary widely across regions. This uncertainty has also hit 70 mn households in rural India who own small dairies NEW DELHI: Baburao Sanap has no clue how to pull himself out of a big mess —he’s saddled with...

-ThePrint.in Our research in Noida for the past two years shows many poor migrant workers do not think of city of work as their home. They are treated as outsiders and live in cramped spaces. Thousands of migrant workers began walking home from Delhi and adjoining areas of the NCR within just a few days of the 21-day coronavirus lockdown, alarming the central and state governments. They ignored calls to stay put...

-The Indian Express Invisible, largely, in the Census and in national sample surveys — and consequently to administrators — field studies have consistently claimed short-term labour mobility in India was significant. Of the many, many countries that COVID has now locked down, India stands, or rather, walks, alone. Bereft of transport, by road or rail, people are walking home, to nearby districts, and to far-off destinations several hundred kilometres away, the mother...