-The Hindu Business Line New Delhi: Several organisations and individuals have sought higher Budget outlays for all departments dealing with the agriculture sector if the Centre is really serious about farmers’ welfare.   “Budget 2015-16 was a serious disappointment in that it actually cut down allocations for Ministry of Agriculture to levels less than 2011-12, i.e., five years earlier! (see table) …. It is clear that farmers’ welfare added to the Ministry’s...

-Frontline Former psephologist Yogendra Yadav, now a member of the political collective Swaraj Abhiyan, recently toured India’s drought-affected districts. He called it a Samvedna Yatra. During the tour, he took note of the agony in rural areas affected by what he calls “one of the worst droughts in independent India” The drought, according to him, has left farmers and the larger rural community in extreme distress, leading to damaging changes in...

-The Hindu Efforts to include children with disabilities in mainstream schools are fraught with challenges, say experts. Chennai: The last few weeks have been hectic for Sangeetha* (name changed) as she has been looking to admit her 11-year-old son into a new school for the coming academic year. “My son has mild Pervasive Development Disorder (PDD) and was studying in a private school in Mogappair but he and 17 other children with special...

-Frontline.in An initiative focussed on Kerala’s development experience exposes a worrying trend of rising inequality and proposes a strategy for sustainable and equitable growth. THE fourth international Congress on Kerala Studies, organised by the A.K.G. Centre for Study and Research in Thiruvananthapuram on January 9-10, has generated much interest for its focus on a worrying new trend in Kerala’s development experience: rising inequality and marginalisation of large sections of people despite...

-Deccan Chronicle Pulses are truly the pulse of life: for the soil, for people and the planet. In our farms they give life to the soil by providing nitrogen. This is how ancient cultures enriched their soils. Farming did not begin with the Green Revolution and synthetic nitrogen fertilisers. Whether it is the diversity-based systems of India, or the three sisters planted by the first nations in North America, or the...