-The Indian Express India’s economy is not doing well. Only carefully crafted policy reforms can turn it around The Indian government recently lowered its economic growth forecast for 2017-18 to 6.5 per cent, and there is reason to be concerned. That the economy would suffer a slowdown after demonetisation was inevitable, as all professional economists could see. But growth dropping to 5.7 per cent and 6.3 per cent in, respectively, the first...

-The Telegraph The Left in Bengal had often criticised him whenever he red-flagged excessive local tyranny, and spoke about the industrial decline in Bengal. The incumbent ruling party may make tall claims about changes in Bengal since the Trinamul government came to power but he has been candid enough to suggest that he hasn't seen much change either in industrial expansion or in investment in infrastructure. Former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has...

-TheWire.in The proposed Market Assurance Scheme should not leave states to fend for themselves when it comes to price support for farmers, especially as the agrarian crisis is one that is caused mainly by central policies. The Budget season, that too in the last full year before the 2019 general elections, brings the debate back to agriculture in the country. Apart from several farmers’ struggles across the country, including the unprecedented unified...

-The Hindu Business Line Lingering distress in the sector may force the govt to think innovatively New Delhi: Agriculture sector, which suffered badly despite higher production in the last two years, may be a key focus area for the NDA government, when it presents its last full-fledged Union Budget before the 2019 general elections. Attending a function recently in the Capital, Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley unequivocally said that that the farm sector...

-Down to Earth Income inequality makes agrarian crisis challenging; inequality is worse among farmers than the formal economy Economists Lucas Chancel and Thomas Piketty recently concluded after a long study that inequality is at its peak in India. It is embedded in popular conscience: “Top 1 per cent of earners captured 22 per cent of total income in the country.” Their study–covering consumption, government accounts and income tax data from 1922...