-Down to Earth The ordinance does not expressly define ‘extraordinary circumstances’: Such legislative ambiguity makes one question the entire exercise of introducing this particular provision As the Union government announced massive reforms as part of the Novel Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) relief package, attention went to three agriculture sector ordinances related to farmers’ trade, contract farming and amendments in the Essential Commodities Act. While each of the three ordinances have far-reaching implications from legal...
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What sold or didn’t in lockdown: Bread, jam up, ice-cream down -Pranav Mukul and Anil Sasi
-The Indian Express While the two-month national lockdown generally dampened spending, fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) companies saw certain unusual trends in demand in certain product categories, company executives said. As India remained locked down in April and May to control the spread of the Novel Coronavirus, people bought more bread, cheese, coffee, and jams — but less fruity cakes. They expectedly bought a lot of hand sanitisers — but not so expectedly,...
More »From tailors to paani poori sellers: MGNREGA lends a hand to migrant returnees -Ishan Kukreti
-Down to Earth DTE visited village Dhamna in Uttar Pradesh’s Jalaun district to see how life in rural India is being sustained by the biggest employment guarantee scheme in the world People don’t eat paani poori during a pandemic. Out-of-business garment shops don’t employ tailors or hire security guards. It’s been five months since the Novel Coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic and the subsequent countrywide lockdown stripped migrant labourers of their livelihood, leading to...
More »As classes go online, how can the Right to Education be guaranteed for students without net access? -Rohan Deshpande
-Scroll.in The expectation that students will buy devices to receive education at their own cost is contrary to the spirit of the RTE Act. In April 2010, India brought into force the Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act, 2009, acknowledging the state’s responsibility to provide free and compulsory education to all children from the age of six to 14 years. The act was a consequence of Article 21A being...
More »Achieving Zero Hunger by 2030 in doubt, UN report warns
-Down to Earth Between 83 million and 132 million people could go hungry in 2020 due to COVID-19, according to the report Achieving the Sustainable Development Goal of ‘Zero Hunger’ that it had mandated by 2030, will be very difficult, a United Nations report released on July 13, 2020, has warned. Six hundred and ninety million people went hungry in 2019 — up by 10 million from 2018, and by nearly 60 million...
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