-Newsclick.in The Interim Budget granted a paltry Rs 500 per month to farmers as relief, fund cuts for dalits, adivasis and minorities, and was silent on agricultural and industrial workers. It was the theatre of absurd in the Lok Sabha on Friday as replacement Finance Minister Piyush Goyal presented the Interim Budget through an election speech, tom-tomming the so-called achievements of the Narendra Modi government over the past five years, offering an...

-The Hindu The Act nullified the controversial March 20 apex court judgment diluting the stringent provisions of the dalit protection law. The Supreme Court on Thursday refused to stay the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Amendment Act of 2018, which nullified the controversial March 20 apex court judgment diluting the stringent provisions of the dalit protection law. The government had brought in the amendments, saying the Scheduled Castes and...

-Frontline.in Interview with Aruna Roy. ARUNA ROY is a well-known social and political activist. A former Indian Administrative Service officer, she resigned from the IAS in 1975 and has since worked with the most oppressed in society. Aruna Roy’s observation on government service is indicative of her future concerns: “Everyone calls it an elite service; I always felt the discourse should be a bit better than what it was. I was shocked...

-News18.com Acclaimed journalist and Founder-Editor of the People’s Archive of Rural India, P Sainath attributes the existential crisis confronting India’s agrarian society to macro-economic policies set in motion 25 years ago. Talking to Anuradha SenGupta, Sainath makes a case for state intervention in agriculture and says the Modi government, with its shifting positions and policies like demonetisation has only aggravated the assault on agrarian livelihoods. Dismissing the buzz about imminent new initiatives...

-The Hindu With no money to feed them, farmers abandon animals It could take Vijay Rawat a week’s labour to build a temporary fence of Babool tree branches and twigs around his 2.5 bigha field. The thorny plants make the process arduous; he has already suffered cuts and scratches. But if he wants to protect his valuable crops, there is little choice. He cannot afford a wire fence. For farmers like Vijay Rawat...