-TheIndiaForum.in The lockdown has devastated Livelihoods at unprecedented levels, causing widespread job losses and hunger. The measures so far will not solve the crisis. India should universalise the PDS, expand cash transfers, and create a national job guarantee scheme. The Covid-19 global pandemic and its associated containment measures have taken a heavy toll on economies and societies worldwide. In India, the national lockdown, imposed on 24 March and subsequently extended three times...
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The echo of migrant footfalls and the silence on policy -Sanjoy Hazarika
-The Hindu There are four things that need to be done in the country in the wake of the pandemic crisis When we hear the word migration, we think of Kerala and West Asia, or the United States and the West. However, the number of Indians who have migrated over the past decades to these geographies is minuscule compared to the vastness of the movement within the country. A few years ago,...
More »The lockdown has highlighted stark inequalities -Zoya Hasan
-The Hindu Instead of embracing the welfare state path, the BJP government is encouraging greater privatisation The novel coronavirus is a global threat, but the pandemic has had an uneven impact across countries and within countries. Historically, social inequality has always been extreme in India. However, the lockdown has sharpened the edges of inequality even further, especially because of the way it has been implemented. Many countries have imposed lockdowns but not...
More »Additional allocation for MGNREGA must be supplemented with steps to make it more effective -Rakshita Swamy
-The Indian Express With nearly eight crore migrant workers returning to their villages, and with an additional allocation for the year, this could be a moment for the true revival of MGNREGA. A revival led by workers themselves. The lockdown has resulted in a massive loss of Livelihoods, and the 400-million strong unorganised workforce is the worst hit. A significant part of this workforce has migrated to cities from rural areas. With...
More »Thomas Piketty, Professor of Economics at Paris-based School of Advanced Studies in the Social Sciences and expert on inequality, interviewed by Narayan Lakshman (The Hindu)
-The Hindu Nationalism is not going to solve the big problems, says the economist. If the catastrophic human toll of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic was the first wave to strike the world this year, its severe economic consequences – including loss of Livelihoods of the poor across countries, leading to massive internal displacement and starvation in many cases – have been the second wave. It is in this context that the seminal work...
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