-Press Release from National Alliance of People’s Movements (NAPM) Government Running away from Responsibility: Pushing Farmers on edges Overlooked the need of majority of population, catering to few Political ‘Jumlas’ continues, ditching farmers once again under the garb of corporate regime; reduced responsibilities of public sector In recent times, announcement of the Union budget seems to be becoming a futile exercise, even with all the publicity and hype associated with it. We...

-The Asian Age The Economic Survey of 2015-2016 is a lovely document which goes into great detail on what is wrong with India on the economic front and offers good workable solutions to solve these problems. One of the points that the survey makes is regarding Indian agriculture becoming cereal-centric. The reason for this lies in the fact that the government procures rice and wheat from farmers at the minimum support price...

-The Hindu The Finance Minister’s prescriptions are a classic case of being unable to see the wood for the trees, be it on the tax proposals, the rural outreach or the bank bailout. It was a marathon achievement: 12,187 words in 111 minutes. True, there were no interruptions; the Finance Minister virtually sent the House to sleep. I have listened to many Budget speeches; and I cannot say that Dr. Manmohan Singh...

-Business Standard Indian economy is closely integrated with the global economy, which is facing a slowdown, and so the headwinds are difficult to avoid, Chief Economic Advisor Arvind Subramanian told journalists in an interaction after presenting the Economic Survey 2015-16. In this uncertain environment, monetary and fiscal policies should aim to purchase insurance, so to speak, against the global slowdown, he said. Edited excerpts: * In the backdrop of a global slowdown,...

-Business Standard Many good ideas for agricultural reform should be in the Budget Shoring up the rural economy that has been crippled because of two successive droughts is clearly a major focus of the upcoming Budget. This is imperative also to revive rural demand for goods and services to stimulate overall economic growth. But how Finance Minister Arun Jaitley will seek to achieve this feat is hard to predict, though what he...