-Financial Express With elections approaching, every party is swearing by farmers and trying to woo them for their votes. The Modi government has already announced a package of Rs 75,000 crore for about 12.6 crore small and marginal farmers. While in absolute terms it looks sizeable, when it is divided by the number of farm families to be covered, it is miniscule—just `6,000 per family per year, which is about 6%...

-The Hindu Business Line Tech must be used in a big way to ensure ryots get compensated quickly, says National Insurance Academy’s Srinivasan Changing rainfall patterns, droughts, flooding and geographical redistribution of pests and diseases have posed a major challenge before Indian agriculture. With the impact of climate change looming large on agricultural productivity, the insurance sector has a big role to play. However, the implementation of crop insurance scheme is mired...

-The Hindu The top-down, rushed approach of the government in reaching out to farmers is likely to end in failure This year’s Interim Budget is being regarded as a big spread for farmers. The government announced its decision to transfer Rs.6,000 every year directly to 12 crore farmers holding cultivable land up to 2 hectares through the Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi (PM-KISAN) scheme. While this is a progressive step, is it...

-The Indian Express The income transfer scheme was the highlight of the budget. But its success will need deft manoeuvring. Like in each of the previous two years, the run-up to the budget this year was rife with fears of significant fiscal slippage if the government caved in to political compulsions. And like in prior years, these fears turned out to be exaggerated. The decline in fiscal deficit ratios has indeed...

-Newsclick.in Dozens of people die every year in a city like Delhi because of the adverse weather conditions. The 70th Republic Day of India was celebrated as usual with fervour throughout the country. Various sections of the people have written elaborately in the media about the relevance of the day, and about the underlying principles of liberty, equality and fraternity in the Indian Constitution. Much has been stated about all these three important...