-Livemint.com The efforts of the government in revamping the crop insurance and land titling schemes are long-term solutions which will take time to bear results The agricultural sector is facing its worst moment in the last three decades. The last time India saw such distress caused by back-to-back deficient rains was during the drought of 1986-87 and 1987-88. The severity of the situation is evident from the stories of migration and...

-The Indian Express Substantial number of interest subvention scheme loans are diverted to non-agricultural uses. Government must switch to an income-support subsidy regime The Union budget for 2016-17 has provisioned Rs 15,000 crore on account of interest subvention for short-term agricultural credit, up by Rs 2,000 crore over the revised estimate for FY16. The mere shifting of this line item from the department of financial services to the department of agriculture...

-Business Standard 2,170 million person-days planned for FY17, compared with 2,391 million person-days last year At a time when nearly half of India's 676 districts are grappling with a second consecutive year of drought, the government expects a decline in the demand for work under the flagship Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS) in 2016-17. The estimated number of days when people in rural India will be offered work under MGNREGS...

The budgetary support to interest subvention scheme has increased by almost 14 times between 2006-07 and 2016-17. However, the much-touted subsidised short-term credit scheme provides little help to the small and marginal farmers, apart from tenant farmers. According to the Committee on Medium-term Path on Financial Inclusion, which submitted its report in December 2015, the interest subvention scheme suffers from 3 types of defects: i. Subsidised credit may not be...

-The Economic Times The contiguous arid region of southern Maharashtra, Karnataka, western Telangana and Andhra Pradesh is facing a second season of severe drought, even as the rest of the country has managed to sow some crop in the October to December rabi season. Of the four states, Karnataka, with the second largest arid zone after Rajasthan, is the worst hit and has gone to the Centre seeking a bailout of...