-The Indian Express The demand is a call for upholding local practices of belonging On March 12, about 50,000 farmers reached Mumbai, walking 165 km in the hope that their elected representatives would listen when they spoke. A majority of these farmers were Adivasis and one of their demands was the implementation of the Forest Rights Act (FRA) and through it, their land rights. The FRA was enacted in 2006 with the...
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A path through the forest -Geetanjoy Sahu
-The Indian Express Forest Rights Act is not an obstacle to growth. Its non-implementation will be politically counter-productive. The farmers’ and forest dwellers’ march from Nashik to Mumbai, and the Maharashtra government’s decision to approve most of their demands within the next six months, has established the fact that land and forest rights are going to be determining factors for political establishments across India. The protest in Mumbai tells us that a...
More »Recent SC Order on Aadhaar is a blow to Welfare: Right to Food Campaign
-National Herald While the concerns of the privileged class due to the mandatory linking has been addressed by the apex court, much greater hardships endured by poor people are ignored, RFC said The recent Supreme Court order on Aadhaar, extending the deadline of Aadhaar linking to bank accounts, phone numbers has been hailed on the social media. But the order has “deeply disappointed” the Right to Food Campaign. “The Right to Food Campaign...
More »'Digital India' Actually Made MGNREGA Less Transparent -Nikhil Shenoy
-TheWire.in The MGNREGA website used to be something of a gold standard on information dissemination. But not anymore. Sanjay Sahni is an anti-corruption activist from Muzaffarpur, Bihar. Formally educated only till Class 5, he used to work as an electrician in Delhi until 2012. He came across the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) website by chance, and after several hours of navigating through the complicated web pages, he saw...
More »A claim for dignity -Pratap Bhanu Mehta
-The Indian Express It is morally obtuse and analytically misleading to see farmers’ long march as a demand for handouts The “long march of the farmers” in Maharashtra refocused attention on the crisis in certain regions in Indian agriculture. It should be the headline news that jolts the nation out of a complacent stupor. The protest made a series of long-standing but familiar demands: Loan waivers, increase in MSP, implementation of Forest...
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