-The Economic Times blog Farmers, from Punjab in the north to Tamil Nadu in the south, have started agitations demanding farm loans be waived. The Uttar Pradesh and Maharashtra governments have already considered it politically expedient to write them off. Some other states may follow the suit. However, such decisions are as misguided as they are misleading. Nonetheless, it will be a mistake to treat the agitations as a domino effect of...

-BusinessWorld.in The recent past saw upsurge of farmers in Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu over demands of implementing Swaminathan Commission's recommendation and the protests are fast spreading their arms in other states as well Keeping in mind that more than half of the Indian population depends on agriculture but the share of agriculture in GDP is nowhere near expectation, in 2002 the then National Democratic Alliance Government led by Atal Bihari Vajpayee called...

-Livemint.com At some 200-plus tur procurement centres in Maharashtra, where Nafed had agreed to purchase the crop till 31 May, the desperation of thousands of farmers represent all that is wrong with government intervention in the agriculture market Wardha, Hinganghat (Vidarbha): Santosh Borkute, a cotton and tur cultivator in Amla village of Wardha district in Vidarbha region, has learned from Marathi newspapers that the Narendra Modi government has completed three years in...

-Scroll.in Instead of wages for a short period of time, the family running the project in Lanka village will create an asset for life. Mahavir Parhaiya’s household in the remote village of Lanka in Latehar district of Jharkhand is bustling with activity. They are busy working on setting up a mango plantation on what was once a barren plot near their house, under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act...

-Livemint.com Abject poverty, high levels of debt, and crop failures among the leading causes behind farmer suicides, according to a study commissioned by agriculture ministry New Delhi: Abject poverty, high levels of indebtedness, crop failures and pressure to repay loans are among the leading causes behind farmer suicides, according to the preliminary findings of a study commissioned by the Union agriculture ministry. The broad findings of the study conducted by the Institute for...