-Business Standard Green revolution pioneer now marked by rising rural despair, with high costs and low incomes pushing a mass of small cultivators into a debt trap Chandigarh: Fifty eight and counting…the number of farmers' suicides in Punjab in the past three months due to agrarian distress is alarming. Maharashtra, Punjab and Telangana top this grim list, the Union government informed Parliament last week. Rainfed states are in a crisis due to two...

-Outlook Though the Modi government claims 33 states and Union Territories are implementing NFSA,​ the facts on the ground ​are very different. Millions wait for proper identification and delivery of the promised highly subsidized foodgrains even as hunger stares at some of the extremely poor households Three years after the National Food Security Act (NFSA) was enacted it appears crores of poor who were to be provided food grains to keep hunger and...

-PTI State govts fear that the new rates would not be able to attract labourers because they are still below the existing minimum wages fixed by the states. The revised MGNREGA wages for the current fiscal announced recently have left various state governments in a quandary as they apprehend the new rates would not be able to attract labourers because they are still below the existing minimum wages fixed by the...

-The Tribune While there are have been debates about the plight of farmers, hardly have we ever heard or read anything about the condition of agricultural labourers. They are the victims of economic downturn in the rural sector. THE economy of Punjab today, embroiled in various economic issues, is showing signs of crisis in the agrarian sector. We often hear and read about the woes of the farmers who are committing suicides,...

Although the focus of erstwhile UPA and the present NDA government has been to achieve higher economic growth by reaping the 'demographic dividend', a recent report from the Central Statistics Office (CSO) informs us that a substantial chunk of the population underwent ageing during the last 60 years. The report entitled Elderly in India: Profile and Programmes 2016 from CSO (that comes under the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation) shows...