-The Statesman Prime Minister Narendra Modi has expressed anguish over suicides by farmers, whose condition has not improved despite the high rate of economic growth. The reason for this distressing state of affairs is that economic policies are badly crafted. The primary effort of the Government has been to increase agricultural production. The price factor is not taken into consideration, the perception being that the farmer will be better off...

-Down to Earth Floods destroy standing crops; in July, hailstorm had damaged farms and orchards As floods washed away belongings of flood-affected people of Jammu and Kashmir, the Centre has intervened to ensure food availability to them. Union food and public distribution minister, Ram Vilas Paswan, has directed senior officials of Food Corporation of India (FCI) to camp at SRInagar and closely monitor the availability of food grains in the affected areas...

-IANS SRINAGAR: More than 50,000 people have been rescued so far, but hundreds are still trapped here as the flood waters receded on Wednesday. Officials said 215 people have died in the Jammu & Kashmir floods. "Unless the flood waters recede completely, and we are able to reach all the submerged areas, we cannot be sure about the exact toll in these floods," a top state official said. Many are trapped in the...

-Women's Feature Service Tribal families in Bankura, West Bengal, living on a stable diet of potato and rice and occasionally some 'daal' (lentils), are now consuming a variety of vegetables, cereals, fruits and animal protein with relish on a daily basis, marking a sea change in the nutrition parametres in one of the most backward districts of India. The credit for this dramatic transformation goes to the dry land sustainable integrated farming...

-LSE Asia Research Centre Background: Farmers' suicides have become an important socio-economic concern in India that has profound implication on the quality of life of farmers and their families. There are not many epidemiological studies on this. We propose to estimate suicide rates for farmers and non-farmers across the states of India and over time. We will also contextualise our results to the discourse on agricultural technology and development in general...