-The Hindu   The Centre of Indian Trade Union (CITU) has strongly opposed the new National manufacturing Policy approved by the Union Cabinet recently and termed it as an attempt by the government to give back door entry to the so-called labour reform of ‘hire and fire' being pressed by the business houses. “The national manufacturing policy will create new islands of lawlessness with bountiful concessions to business houses and absolute jungle raj...

-The Economic Times   Concern over protecting the 'holy cow' status to the job guarantee programme, MGNREGA, appears to be overshadowing genuine worries in the government over increasing shortage of unskilled farm labour. Shooting down a suggestion from Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar that the programme may be suspended during the peak farming season, Rural Development Minister Jairam Ramesh has said that there should not be any dilution in the programme. In an...

The Seed Bill 2010 -- which stayed in controversy because its initial draft seemed to favour agri-business rather than the farmer -- is now ready to get debated and passed in the current session of Parliament. Despite consultations, first in a Parliamentary Standing Committee and later in an all party meeting, a large number of farmers’ unions, opposition parties and civil society groups believe that the Bill fails to protect...

IF YOU walked down the streets of Jantar Mantar in New Delhi between 3-5 August, you would see what TV cameras aren’t putting out on primetime news. Thousands of farmers from Jhabua in Madhya Pradesh to Rohtak in Haryana. On protest. Against the systematic grabbing of their land by various state governments across the political spectrum. On one side of the road, on large green carpets, are about 3,000 farmers,...

Days after it was made public, the new land acquisition bill is facing resistance. While farmer’s unions and civil society groups want more — permanent rights over land,  even in case of a take over, prior consent of people even for public projects, state agencies and developers are unhappy over the restrictive nature of the bill. "As farmers, we would not like to part with our land but if required in larger...