Indian plant biotechnologists feel demoralised and displeased at the recent developments concerning genetically modified (GM) crops. Their dismay is chiefly because the indefinite moratorium on the release of genetically engineered Bt-brinjal has clouded the prospects for several other GM crops that are in the pipeline. Intensive scientific effort and heavy investments have gone into the development of these crops. Their displeasure is largely because the present opposition to the GM technology...

Cash transfers are now suggested by many as a silver bullet for addressing the problems that plague India’s anti-poverty programmes. This article argues instead for evidence-based policy and informed public debate to clarify the place, prospects and problems of cash transfers in India. By drawing on key empirical findings from academic and grey literature across the world an attempt is made to draw attention to three aspects of cash transfers...

-The Times of India   Farmers of Kundagol and surrounding villages of Dharwad took out a procession at Tahsildar's office demanding adequate supply of BT cotton seeds here on Wednesday. The farmers came to buy cotton seeds at Raith Sampark Kendra at Cotton market from distant places, but the farmers were reportedly upset and expressed anguish over the insufficient supply of cotton seeds particularly Kanaka BT cotton seeds. Angry farmers, who...

Deccan Herald   When the researchers and agriculturists across the country are having heated debates on introducing BT brinjal in the country, they have forgotten to protect the desi Brinjal variety ‘Sunde Badane’, which is grown only in few places. The farmers too are in tight spot with no funds to try out new methods of farming to protect these types. Though India and China are said to be the origin of...

In the 1920s, a young Tamil girl sang and starred in her school musical. It was, ostensibly, a private event with few outsiders. Yet so exceptional was her singing that Swadesamitran ran her photograph and wrote about the event. Seeing that photo in the newspaper, her household “was appalled” for, as the music historian V Sriram writes, “good, chaste women never had their photographs published in papers”. Today, this seems like...