-The Financial Express How can the cotton and soybean farmers of Vidarbha and Marathwada supplement their incomes so they can get out of the trap of debt and self-engineered death? That was the theme of Union minister Nitin Gadkari’s ninth edition, four-day agricultural exhibition at Nagpur, called Agrovision, to which I was invited. A promising beginning has been made. In October last year, the National Dairy Development Board commenced operations. It...
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A wilful negligence -Colin Gonsalves
-The Indian Express Governments have not acted on recommendations of committees on farmer welfare How many more farmers must die before the prime minister condescends to take notice? How many rats must the protesting Tamil Nadu farmers at Jantar Mantar eat before the government acts? How many more fake farm loan waiver schemes will be announced before the cabinet realises that farmers cannot be fooled anymore? Despite 300,000 farmers taking their lives...
More »Deceased farmers' kin march to Delhi to find their voice -Nikita Doval and Sayantan Bera
-Livemint.com Hundreds of farmers came to Delhi to tell their stories, but their problems are similar: crop failures, rising debt, losses from farming due to low crop prices leading to suicides New Delhi: A copy of the Telugu daily Sakshi, dating back to 2015, is M. Lakshmi Devi’s constant companion. The newspaper, a part of which is stained by tea, contains a report about the suicide of a debt-burdened farmer—her husband. “We had...
More »The permanent debt trap of Gujarat -Rutam Vora
-The Hindu Business Line Farmers have been borrowing from banks to repay lenders and reversing the cycle Ahmedabad: In the Saurashtra region of Gujarat, a saying goes: “A farmer is always indebted. He is born in debt and dies with a debt. What matters is how he manages this debt in his life.” There is a skew in Gujarat’s water resource distribution. Saurashtra covers 31 per cent of the State’s landmass but gets...
More »Delhi's air - a tragedy of the commons Hardayal Singh
-The Hindu Business Line Individuals are unable to modify present behaviour for future, collective gains. Wrong policies exacerbate this tendency The thick pall of smoke and noxious gases engulfing Delhi is an ecological catastrophe. Reflective of a very serious failure of governance, it is also reminiscent of another serious malaise afflicting our society. This relates to the gross misuse of common resources. One of the first persons to reflect upon this kind of environmental...
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