-The Indian Express After the Finance Ministry rejected the recommendations of two recent government panels, MGNREGA workers in 10 states will get no raises in 2018-19. Minimum farm wages are now higher in many states. The last time the union government brought MGNREGA wages at par with minimum agricultural wages was in 2009. Two years later, in 2011, only four states — Kerala, Goa, Haryana and Mizoram — had minimum agricultural wages...

-Hindkisan.com Alarmingly, despite wages paid under MGNREGA being much lower than the standard minimum wage in most states, increasing number of people from rural households are applying for jobs under the employment scheme. This trend is an indicator of the mounting distress in the rural economy which is aggravated by paucity of jobs. Mocking the economic condition of the distressed rural working community, the Union Government has decided to uphold the low...

-ThePrint.in It is nobody’s case that problems of agriculture can be fixed by soil health cards, loan waivers, crop insurance or e-NAM. The five-day long march of 30,000 farmers from Nashik to Mumbai has touched a chord with urban India. Even though some said they were implementing the agenda of ‘urban Naxalites’, the pictures of poor tribals and farmers, men and women, old and young, walking in heat, many without shoes, will...

-The Hindu Business Line Eleven years since its inception, the State’s farmer’s debt relief commission has quietly eased the burden of debt on poor farmers, and grown to be a model worth emulating Earlier this week 35,000 debt-ridden farmers coursed through Maharashtra, walking 180 km on blistered soles, to converge at Mumbai’s Azad Maidan demanding freedom from debt and fair compensation for their produce. As the government scrounged for solutions, it could’ve...

-The Indian Express First, let us compliment both the parties—farmers and the state government—in Maharashtra’s agrarian crisis for reaching an amicable solution, at least for the time being, and averting a major chaos or violence. First, let us compliment both the parties—farmers and the state government—in Maharashtra’s agrarian crisis for reaching an amicable solution, at least for the time being, and averting a major chaos or violence. Farmers deserve appreciation for...