-TheWire.in Researchers have found that small and Marginal Farmers and Dalit landless labourers are worst affected by the region's agrarian distress. Sangrur/Patiala (Punjab): In the villages of Punjab, strike a conversation on farming  expenses with anyone, and they will say, “Karja tan hai hi (Of course, we have taken loans).” It’s these loans – from both institutional and non-institutional sources – that largely help the rural economy run in the state. But...

-TheCitizen.in 90% rise in Indian billionaires’ wealth There has been a 90% rise in Indian billionaires’ wealth over past decade. It is not accidental. The BJP led government reduced corporate income tax from 30 to 22 percent starting from the financial year 2019/20. New corporates established in India after October 2019 will only pay 15 percent. It has also provided many other opportunities, incentives and foregoing exemptions to corporations. Meanwhile the Union government...

-Down to Earth Power supply in villages still uncertain, they say Farmers in Bihar have questioned the state government’s decision December 21, 2020, to end subsidy to them for diesel, which has been around for almost a decade, on the grounds that rural areas of the state are receiving sufficient power. Farmers in the state told this reporter that the reasons given by the government for rescinding the subsidy did not make sense....

-TheWire.in The economists, who have engaged with issues of agricultural policy, said that the Centre's reforms were based on "wrong assumptions" about why farmers were unable to get remunerative prices. New Delhi: A group of senior economists have released an open letter to the Union agriculture minister Narendra Singh Tomar calling for the repeal of the three contentious farm bills “which are not in the best interests of the small and marginal...

-The Hindu The protesting farmers need sincerity and accountability from the Centre, not edification In light of protests against the new farm laws, the Centre has attempted to educate farmers — a form of instrumental reasoning based on exchange of superior information and data — to convince them of the merits of its reform agenda. Since it is presumed that complex matters of economic policy are beyond the intellectual capacities of agrarians,...