-The Indian Express Diverting rice to produce ethanol during the pandemic is unethical. Surplus grains should be used to feed those in distress. In the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic and a country-wide lockdown came an announcement that was difficult to believe. The press release said the National Biofuel Coordination Committee (NBCC) chaired by the Union Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas has decided to use “surplus” rice available with the Food...

-Scroll.in Sahariya Adivasis in Madhya Pradesh have suggestions for the Modi government. Huddled under a tree in Pahadgarh at half past noon on May 2, the women seemed to be waiting patiently for their turn. Perhaps there was a bank around the corner, I wondered, and they were waiting to withdraw the Rs 500-coronavirus lockdown allowance that the central government had sent to the bank accounts of women under the Jan Dhan...

-TheWire.in Food rights campaigners urge Arvind Kejriwal to intervene, simplify e-coupon process, set up facilitation desks at all ration shops, food department offices. New Delhi: Despite the Delhi high court’s recent direction urging the Delhi government to ensure that all fair price shops operated during working hours and distributed public distribution system (PDS) grains, a survey has revealed that only 62% are functioning and only half of them are distributing grains. Following...

-Down to Earth The Union govt report had asked states to remove provisions that restricted migrants in accessing PDS benefits The Supreme Court asked the Union government on April 30, 2020 to consider adopting a ‘one nation, one ration card’ scheme for migrants stuck in cities due to the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak. This has brought the spotlight on a 2017 government report on migration that emphasised that short-term migrants usually lose...

-Scroll.in Neither testing nor hospital capacities in rural districts seems to have shown much improvement since lockdown was imposed. Five weeks after a nationwide lockdown to contain the spread of the coronavirus was announced to contain the spread of the coronavirus, the Centre will allow migrant workers to return home. Five weeks during which hundreds of thousands of workers set out on foot to cover the hundreds of kilometres that lay between...