Union Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar has responded to Supreme Court's recommendations of distributing grains to the poor for free instead of letting them rot. "It's not possible to implement the Supreme Court's order," the minister said.   On August 13, the apex court had asked the Centre to consider free distribution of foodgrain to the hungry poor of the country instead of allowing it to rot in Food Corporation of India...

The 2010 Seeds Bill that has been introduced in Parliament does address some of the major concerns in the aborted 2004 version, but strangely a number of important correctives – on regulation, consistency and punishment – that had been incorporated in the 2008 version (which lapsed in 2009) have now been modified or dropped altogether. What forces are pushing the government to act against the interests of India’s farmers? The third...

The Supreme Court on Thursday directed the Centre to ensure free distribution of food grains to the hungry poor of the country instead of allowing it to rot in the FCI godowns. "Give it to the hungry poor instead of it (grains) going down the drain," a bench of Justices Dalveer Bhandari and Deepak Verma said in an order. The bench further asked the Centre to ensure construction of a...

There is an interesting debate on food security and we should get the Planning Commission’s perspective on this. But as I write this, the Planning Commission Web site still does not have the mid-term appraisal, so Yojana Bhavan must still be polishing it. This column has, over time, taken the position that the food security programme is really important and a country growing as fast as India simply cannot ignore...

JHABUA, India — Inside the drab district hospital, where dogs patter down the corridors, sniffing for food, Ratan Bhuria’s children are curled together in the malnutrition ward, hovering at the edge of starvation. His daughter, Nani, is 4 and weighs 20 pounds. His son, Jogdiya, is 2 and weighs only eight. Landless and illiterate, drowned by debt, Mr. Bhuria and his ailing children have staggered into the hospital ward after falling...