The Kashmir Himalayan region has been a hotly disputed area for decades, with both India and Pakistan laying claim to it. But some Kashmiris see their homeland not only as an area of conflict, but also as a land of agricultural opportunity. Indian-controlled Kashmir is a predominately agricultural region that produces fruit, grains and vegetables for the Indian market. More than 60 percent of the country's apples are grown there. Khuram Mir...

Himachal Pradesh has now brought wheat and barley crops under an insurance scheme to protect them from adverse climatic conditions, an official statement said Sunday. The National Agricultural Insurance Scheme will cover wheat and barley crops too across the state during the 2010-11 rabi season, said the statement. Earlier, maize, paddy, potato and ginger crops were covered. Likewise, the government last year initially launched an apple crop insurance scheme in Shimla and...

In the first week of September, two things happened in western Uttar Pradesh. The first is that a township that was supposed to be constructed in Aligarh district as part of the Yamuna Expressway project was scrapped. The second was that the UP government announced a revised compensation scheme for the acquisition of land. And now, more than two months later, that bears fruit: the township is back on, and...

Ashok Chavan may have been forced to quit within weeks of his name being linked to the alleged shady dealings involving the Adarsh Housing Society but the CBI has been probing the members of the group for almost six months now, suspecting some of them to be proxy owners.The investigation was launched into the source of income of the defence officers and Central employees who own apartments in their name...

Kinnauri rajmash, chilgoza (pinus gerardiana), walnut and dried apricots have always been in high demand and commanded a competitive price in the market, but connecting them with the concept of organic food has yielded high premiums for farmers in the state. Himalayan Organisation for Organic Agri Products (HIMOARD), based at Rampur in Shimla, has brought international recognition for these farm products of the tribal district of Kinnaur in Himachal Pradesh....