-The Telegraph The chief minister announced a new scheme — Matir Shristi — for six backward districts in the western part of the state Mamata Banerjee on Wednesday announced a series of schemes for income generation to ensure livelihood for rural populace in the post-lockdown period as the state government realised the need of securing flow of funds at the grassroots level. “Life and livelihood have come to a halt (because of the...

-The Telegraph The Mamata Banerjee government claims that its khadya sathi food scheme has eliminated hunger Calcutta: A study carried out by the Pratichi Institute and the Asiatic Society has found out that a significant proportion of tribal people in Bengal had faced “food scarcity of varying degrees” in the past one year. The finding drills holes into Mamata Banerjee government’s claims that its policy of cheap food grain supply, known as khadya...

-Livemint.com The tribal belt of south Bengal has become ground zero of a grim battle with an ever-increasing population of visiting elephants The elephants are here,” Jiten Singh declares without any show of emotion as we arrive at Tapoban (Madhyapara) village. About 65km from Kharagpur town, Tapoban is a tribal hamlet deep within the vast forested terrain known as Jangalmahal, in West Bengal. It is nearing dusk. Ordinarily, the village would be...

-Mumbai Mirror A behind the scenes look at what’s driving the region’s return to traditional paddy techniques. It’s certainly not the global shift towards organic cultivation. A recent study conducted by Harvard University has established that consuming just one cup of white rice (polished rice) a day can put you at risk of diabetes, regardless of your nationality or whether you have a family history of the disease. Bhairav Saini lives in...

-The Telegraph First Alisha, now Raghunathpur. The post-Singur verdict demand for return of land today spread to Purulia's Raghunathpur, where around 3,000 farmers launched an agitation to get back 6,300 acres acquired from them for an industrial park that is yet to come up. The Left government had acquired over 7,420 acres for the proposedRaghunathpur Steel and Allied Industrial Park between 2007 and 2010. Of this, various companies have taken possession of 2,915...