-The Times of India NEW DELHI: What is driving the fellowship hike protests across centrally-funded institutions such as the IITs, IISc,NITs or the IISERs? The last hike for the 1.25 lakh research scholar community was in 2014, that too after a gap of four years. With no hike since then and no communication from the government, scholars across institutions have joined hands to launch a nationwide movement demanding a better stipend. Apart...

-Economic and Political Weekly India is witnessing a new wave of agrarian protest. Grounded in a deep crisis in the country's agricultural sector, these protests express a deep sense of disappointment in the economic policies of the Modi regime. This article discusses how the new agrarian struggle should be understood as a symptom of the disintegration of the Modi regime's project of authoritarian populism. However, the author proposes that addressing India's...

-The Indian Express The Bill provides for “surveillance, inspection, operation and maintenance of specified dams for prevention of dam failure related disasters and to provide for institutional mechanism to ensure their safe functioning”. New Delhi: WHEN THE government introduced the Dam Safety Bill, 2018 in Lok Sabha last week, BJD floor leader Bhartruhari Mahtab questioned Parliament’s competence to do so. Days later, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister K Palaniswami wrote to the...

-TheWire.in "The Central Government’s contribution to old-age pensions...has stagnated at just Rs 200 per month since 2006. This is unfair." New Delhi: Sixty economists from across the country have written to finance minister Arun Jaitley, asking him to ensure that social security pensions and maternity benefits get adequate attention in the Union Budget 2019. They argue that they had made a similar “modest” request before the 2018 Budget, but it went unheeded. The...

-Livemint.com Loan waivers and the promise to raise MSP cannot solve the problem The victory of Congress party in the recent assembly elections of Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan has brought the agrarian crisis in rural areas to the centre of political debate. While there are several factors in election victories, the severity of the agrarian unrest was surely a major factor. While there is consensus that the incumbent Bharatiya Janata Party...