-NDTV There is the reality of a farmer's suicide and then there are versions of this reality. Whether you choose to accept the farmer's context of poverty, debt and extreme risk, or deny it, often depends on the class and profession you belong to. Fields pockmarked with brown mounds create a surreal setting. At least nine suicides by farmers have been linked to the crisis in West Bengal's potato belt. Farmers have...

-The Economic Times NEW DELHI: The Centre has decided to extend its flagship rural jobs scheme to include afforestation as part of a move to create more durable assets through the programme that Prime Minister Narendra Modi recently derided as a living monument to the previous UPA government's failures and promised to overhaul. Officials said the National Mission for a Green India (GIM) and the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act...

-Hindustan Times The government's fiscal management plan in the budget could see a roadmap on extending the controversial cash transfer schemes from just entitlements to subsidies, a move that could add fuel to the already surcharged atmosphere over the land acquisition bill. The finance ministry has issued instructions to bring all Central schemes having a financial component under the direct benefit transfer (DBT) from April, apparently to plug leakages and to keep...

-Business Standard While the revised estimates of the gross domestic product (GDP) suggest the Indian economy turned the corner in 2013-14, concerns remain over the durability of this nascent recovery. Particularly worrying is the recent slowdown in rural wage growth, which signals a weakening of rural demand. Growth in rural wages, which had averaged 18 per cent in the previous few years, fell to less than five per cent in September...

-Business Standard Workdays under the scheme in 2014 crashed to less than half of previous year's, delay in fund transfers and payment to workers, says rural devt ministry report The former Union rural development minister Nitin Gadkari caused 'psychological' damage to the Mahatma Gandhi Rural Employment Guarantee Programme (MGNREGS) with statements questioning the need to continue the scheme across the entire country, the ministry has assessed in its new report. Gadkari was minister...