With one cotton farmer committing suicide every alternate day, the district has become a virtual killing field for growers grappling with the socio-economic upheaval caused by crop failure this season. The current spate of suicides started at the beginning of the last quarter of 2010, when it became clear that the excessive rain irreparably damaged the crops. Dismal yields and mounting debts drove 30 farmers to death during this period. With 16...

Billions of dollars are being made by investors in a speculative "food bubble" that's created record food prices, starving millions and destabilising countries, experts now conclude. Wall Street investment firms and banks, along with their kin in London and Europe, were responsible for the technology dot-com bubble, the stock market bubble, and the recent U.S. and UK housing bubbles. They extracted enormous profits and their bonuses before the inevitable collapse of...

As a part of Statewide visit in crop affected areas, the Chief Minister Shri Shivraj Singh Chouhan today reached Daiyarpur village in Vidisha district and comforted crop affected farmers. He informed that the State Government has increased relief amount from Rs 500 crore to Rs 600crore in order to extend maximum financial help to crop affected farmers. No different yardstick will be applied in distribution works. Every affected farmers will...

Deforestation, poachers, illicit liquor-brewers forcing them to migrate Large-scale deforestation and the disturbances caused by poachers and illicit liquor-brewers could be forcing king cobras to migrate from their natural habitat in bamboo-rich dense evergreen forests to villages nearby. A study conducted by the researchers of the Department of Zoology, University of Kerala, and the Reptile Study Group, Thiruvananthapuram, has revealed that the king cobra, the world's longest venomous snake, is under...

Centre will bring in amendments to the essential commodities Act to achieve this purpose: Thomas Union Minister of State for Food and Civil Supplies K.V. Thomas has said the Central government will soon institute mechanisms to regulate private retail chains in the context of the fluctuating price regime and shortages in the supply of essential commodities. Addressing a ‘meet-the-press' programme organised by the Kesari Memorial Journalist Trust here on Saturday, Prof....