-IPS News NIYAMGIRI: As the rhythmic thumping of dancing feet reaches a crescendo, the women offer a song to their forest god for a bountiful harvest. Then, with earthen pots on their heads and their spiritual creatures – a pigeon and a hen – in tow, they proceed in single file on a long march away from their village of Kadaraguma, located on the Niyamgiri mountain range in the Rayagada District of...

-Deccan Herald Those who sipped a cup of Yashoda’s home-brewed tea have never been unimpressed. The special tea is prepared using locally available herbs and aromatic leaves. Yashoda and her husband Chandraprakash of Biligerepalya village in Tiptur taluk of Tumakuru district are well-known for their innovative activities that include value addition of agricultural produces. Until 2008, the couple were into chemical farming, much like everyone else around them. At a time when they were grappling...

-Business Standard State plans to supply it under Anna Bhagya scheme from July Mysuru: Karnataka will distribute ragi, a finger millet endemic to South India, under its ‘Anna Bhagya’ scheme from the next month. The distribution of ragi, considered one of the most nutritious of foods, is rich in calcium and protein with a good amount of iron and other minerals and also has a low fat content, and will be distributed under...

-Economic and Political Weekly A categorical distinction is facing rough weather--that between urban and rural. If we take just agriculture, there is so much of the outside world that comes in not just as external markets but as external inputs. Further, many of our villages barely qualify as rural if we were to take occupation alone. So the earlier line that separated the farmer from the worker in towns is slowly...

-The Times of India HYDERABAD: In a major policy shift that could shape the future of agriculture in Telangana, the government on Wednesday said it was getting ready to grow dry crops such as ragi and bajra in view of an impending drought after the killer heat wave in the region. Unseasonal rains in MarchApril had damaged Rabi crops in 75,000 hectares across nine districts of the state, forcing the government to...