As Madhya Pradesh begins to harvest a bumper wheat crop, the state is finding that measures put in place to ensure that the powerful do not game the system are having the unintended effect of keeping out the most marginalised. In anticipation of a bumper harvest, the MP government announced a Rs 100 bonus that it would pay wheat farmers above the central government-fixed Minimum Support Price of Rs 1,120. "It...

Itself the outcome of a bottom-up movement, the Jan Lokpal bill ironically proposes a centralised framework against graft. Without checks and balances. There was never any doubt that India needs a strong Lokpal Act. The protest has paved the way for its enactment. With the exultation over the anti-corruption campaign’s ‘victory’ quieting down, it’s time to take stock. Nuanced arguments—and indeed substance—have to recover lost ground to take the discourse...

Violence is back in West Bengal's Purba Medinipur district as the polling date for the 16 Assembly seats here draws close: Communist Party of India (Marxist) cadres are returning, under police protection, to the villages from where they fled in the wake of the Trinamool Congress' stunning successes here in recent elections. In West Bengal's ground zero, Nandigram — located in Purba Medinipur district — the problem is particularly acute. The...

Distribution of basic food grains and fuel at controlled prices every month through the Public Distribution System (PDS) could be the largest service provided by the Indian State, touching as it does over 65 million families through a network of nearly half a million retail shops. Given that the urban middle class has little stake in the health of the PDS, there have to be some compelling reasons for the...

Even as concerns are emerging about generalised inflation gripping the economy, with reports of rising wage rates, food price inflation remains the citizen’s core concern. Macroeconomic authorities have been chasing a variety of targets – monetary, fiscal and supply-side constraints – to get a better grip on prices. It is often hoped that higher prices would translate into increased production since farmers would respond positively to price signals. What then...