-Newslaundry.com Daily wage work has dried up and there’s no help forthcoming from the government. The narrow lanes cutting through farmland are dotted with brick, wood and asbestos shanties. One in particular, located in Dhakephal village in Maharashtra’s Beed district, is lit by a single yellow bulb. It’s home to Swati Sriganga Ramdave, 24, and her family of seven. Outside the house, Swati’s youngest daughter Aarohi, 4, tugged at her grandmother Gitabai’s sari,...

-TheWire.in The COVID-19 has increased risks for children, especially those from vulnerable communities. The COVID-19 pandemic has pushed 100 million more into poverty, says a recent UN report. In our own backyard, what about India’s 454 million internal economic migrants, who constitute 37% of the total population? How many of them are youth and women? On June 10, the International Labour Organisation and UNICEF jointly surmised that 160 million children are in child...

-The Hindu Remigration of young, trained workers Bihar, Jharkhand workers at minimal levels A survey of young, semi-skilled migrants from rural Bihar and Jharkhand in April 2021 has found that last year’s lockdown led to an informalisation of labour among men, while most of the women simply dropped out of the work force altogether. It also found that the number of out-of-State migrants halved between March 2020 and 2021, with no net effect...

In his Mann ki Baat address to the nation on 30th May, 2021, Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi appreciated the fact that the farmers received "more than the minimum support price (MSP) for mustard" pertaining to the rabi production. One can easily guess from this statement of the PM that the mustard growers in Haryana (and elsewhere) preferred to sell their produce to private traders in the open market instead...

-The Telegraph poverty research pioneer cites US, UK and EU experience; Niti Aayog vice-chairman disagrees, says there’s no guarantee ‘helicopter money’ will lead to spending Nobel laureate Abhijit Banerjee has stepped up to the firing line by arguing the government should make bigger direct cash payments under the MGNREGA scheme to help people who have slid into poverty due to the pandemic. The government has already indicated it’s not keen on larger direct...