-The Economic Times Politicians in India firmly believe that the woes of farmers can be solved with freebies: free electricity, free water, Farm Loan Waivers, fertilisers and seed subsidies, minimum support prices, etc. Little attention is paid to what really ails Indian agriculture: low productivity. From rice to wheat to coarse grains and pulses, from cash crops to food crops, Indian agriculture is punctured with very low productivity. Let's start with rice....

-Hindustan Times Herein lies the crisis of farmer politicians. They have neither aspirations nor the power of coercion working for them. Rural distress dominated discussions around the political-economy in 2017, and will likely continue to do so in 2018, much to the consternation of political incumbents. Those in opposition will be looking forward to harvesting this anger for their own benefit. One question is worth asking though. Where is the farmer-politician in...

-PTI Arun Jaitley had last year said that the Centre will not be part of a state's fiscal leverage in waiving farm loans and the cost has to be borne by the states Mumbai: The Maharashtra government today made allocations worth Rs 14,240 crore for the farm loan waiver scheme and for repayment to farmers whose produce was purchased by the state. The state's cooperation and marketing department today issued a Government Resolution...

-Hindustan Times Farm distress is not confined to Gujarat alone. The economic viability of farming is increasingly coming under stress. Uncertain rainfall and price fluctuations can make things even worse in bad years What is the biggest political economy takeaway from the 2017 Gujarat elections? The schism between India and Bharat is for real. The BJP’s victory is only due to its dominance in urban areas. The Congress has won a majority...

-Livemint.com Maharashtra minister for cooperation Subhash Deshmukh admits to delays and problems in the implementation of farm loan waiver in the state Mumbai: When Maharashtra’s mega farm loan waiver was announced in June, it was initially planned to help 8.9 million indebted farmers. This was later wound down to cover 5.6 million farmers. Five months on, it has managed to reach just 1.7 million. State minister for co-operation Subhash Deshmukh said on Tuesday...