-The Hindustan Times   Once the remaining two phases of India's seemingly never-ending elections are done and dusted and the results are declared, for whoever it might be that wins and gets to form the government, the first thing on the agenda should be to get down on their knees and pray to the rain gods and wish that the monsoon doesn't disappoint this year - that it comes on time and...

-Live Mint To alleviate poverty and extend true food security to its people India must bring efficiency to public expenditures In the Indian economy, where almost half of the average household's expenditures goes toward food and half the labour force is engaged in agriculture, one cannot simply wish away the centrality of agriculture just because its contribution to gross domestic product (GDP) hovers around a comparatively low 14%. India's agriculture is responsible...

-Down to Earth   India's first PM born after Independence will face the old problem of poverty eradication India may have its first post-Independence-born prime minister this June. But what difference would it make in terms of the country's development agenda? How will the new prime minister face the challenges that have been there since before Independence? Or, what are the developmental challenges the new prime minister may find difficult to address? Arguably,...

-Reuters   The extra irrigated area would cut India's dependence on annual monsoon rains that water crops grown on nearly half of the country's farmlands New Delhi: India plans to expand its farmland under irrigation by at least a tenth in the next three years, potentially boosting grains output by an equal proportion in the world's second-biggest rice and wheat producer, a top government official told Reuters. The extra irrigated area would cut India's...

A study by Jonathan Kennedy and Lawrence King, published in the Lancet journal Globalization and Health (2014) has found that liberalization of the agricultural sector in the early-1990s is responsible for the agrarian crisis and, therefore, farmers with certain socio-economic characteristics -- cash crops cultivators, with marginal landholdings, and debts-are particularly at risk of committing suicide. In short, the study detects that the differences in the structure of agricultural production explain...