-Hindustan Times Move beyond State-market, rural-urban, agri-non agri and welfare-growth binaries. They are linked This has been a difficult three months for India. The policy response to the coronavirus disease (Covid-19) and the lockdown has forced it to confront long-ignored realities about the Indian economy — its fragility, regional and spatial concentration and deep structural inequity. It also made visible sources of precarious resilience. Agriculture and associated supply chains, for instance, held...

-Down to Earth Distress among marginal farmers and unavailability of food to migrant labourers has been largely ignored in Union government’s economic stimulus   Agriculture and allied activities are considered ‘essential’ and officially face no restriction to harvest and supply to the market, even in the middle of the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic. But an agrarian crisis stemming from systemic failures needs to be considered for immediate policy response. The current distress...

-Newsclick.in The Rs 3 lakh crore credit guarantee scheme for micro, small and medium enterprises is unclear, contradictory and practically difficult to implement. The scheme may create more problems than it solves. On May 12, in his televised address to the nation, Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced the Atma Nirbhar Bharat Abhiyan or the “campaign to make India self-reliant,” comprising what was claimed to be a Rs 20 lakh crore package to...

-The Indian Express June 5 was World Environment Day. We must strive to preserve our environment better if we want to prevent pandemics like COVID-19 This year’s celebration of World Environment Day — on June 5 — has been different compared to all the previous years, as human civilisation faces one of its biggest crises. The COVID-19 pandemic is larger than the environmental crisis of the 1960s and ’70s, which prompted the...

-The Hindu QuaranTeen Warmline, a peer-to-peer support helpline, is a safe space for teenagers to discuss their problems amid the pandemic Tara Dave spends every evening on phone calls. Not surprising for a 17-year-old, but what is unusual is that every day, she speaks to children across the country, as part of QuaranTeen Warmline, a peer-to-peer support helpline, exclusively for teenagers aged 15 to 18, that she helms. “Many hotlines have come up...