-The Hindu Income support must be provided to at least the most vulnerable farmers Our farm policy is so bad, the proverb ‘you reap what you sow’ isn’t true any longer. A bumper crop is no different from a drought, for it too depresses farm incomes. Good rains, excessive sowing and the bumper harvest last year produced gluts in the market that sent the prices of many crops, and therefore farm incomes, crashing....

-Livemint.com According to Nafed, the central agency assigned to procure directly from farmers at government-set MSP, 6.34 million tonnes of pulses and oilseeds were purchased from about 3.5 million farmers till 22 June New Delhi: The central government procured a record Rs29,070 crore worth of pulses and oilseeds from farmers at minimum support prices (MSPs) in the 2017-18 crop season, arresting what could have been a sharper fall in wholesale prices. The procurement...

-The Indian Express Social media giant Facebook has offered to remove content flagged by the Election Commission in the last 48 hours before voting when no political campaigning is allowed, it is learnt. New Delhi: Social media giant Facebook has offered to remove content flagged by the Election Commission in the last 48 hours before voting when no political campaigning is allowed, it is learnt. Facebook made the proposal in a meeting...

-The Hindu It’s time to debate the modalities of the next Census, given the earlier confusion over caste data. As the 2011 Census approached, demands for inclusion of data on caste in Census reached a crescendo. P. Chidambaram, the Union Home Minister at the time, was opposed to collecting caste data and blocked it by claiming that it was logistically impossible for the Census, but caste information could be collected via the...

-Hindustan Times According to the 2011 census, 45% of India’s total workers are employed in the non-agricultural sector. This number excludes those who work as either cultivators or agricultural labourers Employment generation (or the lack of it) will probably be the biggest issue in next year’s general elections. India’s employment challenge is broadly perceived as one of moving agricultural workers to remunerative jobs in the non-farm sector, and rightly so. With a...