-Reuters   PERLE: As a shiny red harvester bounces across the black earth into the first row of sugar cane, excited schoolchildren run after it and several dozen men stand gaping in the wake of its swift progress. It's the first time that Perle, a village on the banks of the Krishna river in Maharashtra state, has seen a machine used for cutting the tough cane. "This machine will harvest my entire field today,"...

The Centre has cited three shortcomings in the implementation of the rural job scheme in Bengal and linked the next instalment of grant to the resolution of the problems. In a letter sent to chief minister Mamata Banerjee yesterday, Union rural development minister Jairam Ramesh has identified the critical areas as low completion rate of works, delay in e-transfer of wages and inadequate action on complaints of irregularities. “Let me make it...

HETA, India – At the entrance to this village in India’s eastern state of Jharkhand, a large pond glistened under the bright autumn sun. Yellow and blue lilies surrounded it. A tailor was stitching clothes outside his shop while a few boys nearby were playing carrom on the lid of a rusted oil barrel. It was a tranquil, rustic setting – a candidate for a landscape painting, it seemed. But it...

-The Times of India Buying a tribal bride may no longer be easy for boys from upper caste communities that have low sex ratios. Tribals across Gujarat are increasingly resentful of their daughters marrying into communities with few girls because of female foeticide. The Garasiya tribals of north Gujarat have even issued a diktat to the members not to marry girls outside the community. The leaders met in Shamlaji earlier this month...

-The Economic Times The government has decided to lift the ban on cotton exports from Monday, just a week after imposing it, buckling under pressure from farmers, traders and politicians.  "Keeping in view the facts, the interests of farmers, industry and trade, a balanced view has been considered by the group of ministers to roll back the ban and a formal order will be made public on Monday by the government," Commerce...