-The Times of India Six years ago, the Sachar Committee reportshowed that the Muslim community in India suffers from severe deprivations in education, employment, health services, public infrastructure, access to financial services leading to much higher poverty than other religious groups, somewhat like the condition of scheduled castes and tribes. The government responded by setting up a separate ministry for minority affairs, and launching several programs to provide benefits to the...

-The Hindu ‘Governments must protect interest of producer, consumer’ The controversy regarding India’s permission to allow foreign direct investment in multi-brand retail and growing “land grab” in Africa by multinational corporations are being closely watched globally by agriculture experts, researchers and donors. At a workshop here on ‘Supporting Policy Research to Inform Agricultural Policy in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia’ — which a few journalists from both regions were invited to attend —...

-The Hindu ICAR “shielding errant officials” by delaying the report In a damning indictment of the way some Bt cotton varieties were developed and commercialised in the country, a committee headed by Prof. S.K. Sopory, Vice-Chancellor of JNU, found that indigenous Bikaneri Nerma (BN) Bt cotton variety was contaminated by a gene patented by Monsanto. Having found lapses in the “BNLA106 event”, the committee has held as “invalid” the data obtained from bio-safety...

-The Hindu The technical glitches that plague cash transfers in Jharkhand may not have arisen with a simpler system that does not need Internet connectivity Pilot cash transfer projects taken up in Jharkhand for MGNREGA wages have achieved little success due to a variety of logistical, human and technological problems. A year after the launch of these projects, the problems remain unsolved. In Ramgarh district, a majority of the beneficiaries are in Dohakatu...

-The Hindu While Gujarat’s GDP growth in the last two decades has been notable, it is not reflected in employment, wages, health or education There is a widespread belief that Gujarat is a shining star on the Indian growth horizon and that all other States would do a great service to Indian masses by emulating the model of development that Gujarat embarked upon under the stewardship of Narendra Modi. A recent study,...