-The Telegraph A day later, Congress and TMC, which has the chairmanship of the committee, said it was a misrepresentation and evidence of the BJP’s “dirty tricks department in action ” New Delhi: Opposition parties were left scrambling for an explanation after a parliamentary panel in which they had representation green-signalled one of the three contentious farm laws in a report tabled in Parliament on Friday. In the report tabled in the Lok...

-The Indian Express In a written reply to a question in the Lok Sabha on whether the number of lakes has declined substantially across the country over recent years, MoEFCC Prakash Javadekar said rapid urbanisation, development activities and anthropogenic pressures have stressed water bodies. Over Rs 1,000 crore has been released for the conservation of 157 wetlands in the country under the National Plan for Conservation of Aquatic Eco-systems (NPCA), Union Minister...

-The Tribune The economic argument in support of market reforms, claiming that farm incomes go up when the number of farmers recedes, has turned out to be untrue. America has lost more than 5 million farms in less than 100 years, and Australia 25 per cent of its farms between 1980 and 2002. The speed at which farmers across the globe have got out of agriculture hasn’t increased farm incomes, but...

Quite often it is argued by mainstream economists that a sizeable chunk of the Union Budget every year is wasted because the Government spends that on food and fertiliser subsidies. The burgeoning size of these two subsidies relative to the entire budget as well as the gross domestic product (GDP) is often used to build the argument that economic as well as environmental sustainability of the country is at stake...

-Newsclick.in The NITI Aayog recommendations to reduce coverage under the NFSA are in tandem with liberalisation of agriculture pushed forward by the government with the passage of three farm laws. On February 28, 2020, it was reported that the central government’s think tank, NITI Aayog, in a discussion paper recommended a revision in the coverage of urban and rural populations under the National Food Security Act (NFSA), 2013 to generate annual savings...