-The Hindu The Aadhaar Bill opens the door to mass surveillance. This danger needs to be seen in the light of recent attacks on the right to dissent. No other country, and certainly no democratic country, has ever held its own citizens hostage to such a powerful infrastructure of surveillance. The Aadhaar project was sold to the public based on the claim that enrolment was “voluntary”. This basically meant that there was...

-Livemint.com The Union government has cut the prices of genetically-modified cotton seeds and slashed royalty fees by 74% The Union government’s decision to cut the prices of genetically-modified (GM) cotton seeds, popularly known as Bt cotton, and slash royalty fees, will have a positive impact on cotton farming in Maharashtra, India’s top state in terms of area under cotton cultivation. The Maharashtra government’s agriculture officials, cotton growers and officials at the Nagpur-based...

-IndiaSpend Agro-companies growing crops are allowed the same tax relief as individuals in states levying no agricultural income tax Mt Abu: It’s reasonably well known that income from agriculture attracts no tax in India. What isn’t quite as well known is that of more than 400,000 taxpayers claiming exemption for agricultural income in the assessment year 2014-15, the biggest were seed giant Kaveri seeds—it claimed Rs 186.63 crore exemption and made a profit...

-The Hindu Business Line Govt acts on a letter from farmers’ union on bollworm developing resistance to technology   Hyderabad: Even as it announced a nation-wide uniform price for cottonseed for the upcoming kharif season, the Union government has asked Mahyco Monsanto Biotech (India) Limited why it should not revoke the patent it granted for the Bollgard II technology. The Department of Industry Policy and Promotion (DIPP) has served a show cause notice to...

-FirstPost.com Giant agricultural corporations are seriously impacting the right to food of women, especially in developing countries like India by increasingly suing farmers for breaching patent laws, a UN expert said. “These big companies are suing farmers because the farmers are using (patented seeds) without the permission (from agricultural corporations) or (are not) buying the particular seeds. This is a very serious issue and millions of dollars the corporations are taking from...