-Hindustan Times Three new lentil (dal) varieties belonging to a family of legumes known to be poisonous since Hippocrates’s time could be back on your plates. But should you eat them? India’s chronic shortage of pulses – the essential soupy item in everyday meals – has made a cheap source of protein for millions very expensive. So, the country is thinking of bringing back khesari dal (scientific name: lathyrus odoratus), which became...

-The Indian Express New crop insurance scheme is welcome. Its litmus test: Whether crop-damage assessment can be done within two weeks of the extreme weather event and compensation paid a week after that The Narendra Modi-LED government needs to be complimented for taking the first major step to revamp the crop insurance system to address the increasing distress in Indian farming. With back-to-back droughts, and unseasonal rain and hail in certain...

-CounterView.net In an incident which has created a flutter among Right to Information (RTI) activists across India, goonda elements, said to be close to a BJP legislator in Rajasthan have brutally attacked the 100-day Accountability or Jawabdehi Yatra, begun by Magsaysay Award winner and pioneer of the RTI Act Aruna Roy. The incident took place in Aklera area of Zalawad district, which falls into Manoharthana constituency. According to eye-witnesses, MLA Kanwar Lala...

-The Telegraph Jaipur: A rally flagged off by social activist Aruna Roy was attacked today in Rajasthan chief minister Vasundhara Raje's constituency by suspected BJP activists, LED by an MLA. At least six rallyists were injured. An FIR has been fiLED against the MLA and others. The Aklera police station assistant SHO, Manmohan Bairwa, said: "The FIR has been lodged against the present MLA of Aklera and 30-35 unidentified people.... No arrests have...

-CaravanMagazine.in Bina Agarwal is a Professor of Development Economics and Environment at the University of Manchester, UK. Prior to this, she was the Director and Professor of Economics at the Institute of Economic Growth, Delhi University. Agarwal has written extensively on land, livelihoods and property rights; environment and development; the political economy of gender; poverty and inequality; legal change; and agriculture and technological transformation. Her best known work is A Field...