-The Indian Express While a focused jobs guarantee thrust could help mitigate financial distress for tens of thousands of rural families, maharashtra’s performance on MGNREGA until now this year has been lacklustre on several counts. Mumbai: As drought conditions worsen in across large parts of rural maharashtra and sowing for rabi crops adversely affected, the state is expected to give a fresh push to the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee...

-The Indian Express Trucks carrying sugarcane were stopped on the Pune-Bengaluru highway near Tandulwadi in Sangli districts, bringing traffic to a halt. Kohlapur: Harvesting and transportation of sugarcane in western maharashtra remained paralysed for the third day on Sunday due to a protest by farmers against sugar mills over partial payment of dues. Led by Swabhimani Shetkari Sanghthana, a prominent organisation of farmers in this region, the farmers in the sugarcane heartland...

-News18.com Acclaimed journalist and Founder-Editor of the People’s Archive of Rural India, P Sainath attributes the existential crisis confronting India’s agrarian society to macro-economic policies set in motion 25 years ago. Talking to Anuradha SenGupta, Sainath makes a case for state intervention in agriculture and says the Modi government, with its shifting positions and policies like demonetisation has only aggravated the assault on agrarian livelihoods. Dismissing the buzz about imminent new initiatives...

-Livemint.com Delayed assessment of loss and settlement of claims by insurance companies may have led to farmers losing faith in Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana, say analysts New Delhi: Sharad Markad, a lanky teenager from a marginal farming family in maharashtra, spent the first day of 2019 scrounging for funds. Faced with a drought, the third in the past five years, Markad had taken it upon himself to build a community cattle...

-The Economic Times Even though the scheme had been ranked as the world's largest public works programme by the World Bank, it is being systematically undermined with illegal restrictions on its budget allocation, severe payment delays and low wages. Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) has been a tried and tested measure to target rising unemployment and ease rural distress in the country. The Rural Employment programme, which guarantees 100...