A small farmer in Maharashtra, whose high-yielding rice variety is popular in five States, is denied the benefits of his research. TWENTY-SEVEN years ago, Dadaji Khobragade of Nanded Fakir village in Chandrapur district of Maharashtra noticed yellow seeds in three spikes of a paddy stalk in his field. Intrigued by the freak harvest, he preserved the grains. He subsequently planted them in a six-foot square plot, which he covered with thorny...

If home minister P Chidambaram’s recent letter to West Bengal chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee is any indication, it has taken the Union home ministry seven years to realise that arming civilians to fight Naxalites is a bad idea. How much longer will it take for them to realise that the current paramilitary-based approach in Chhattisgarh is similarly bound to fail? From 2003 onwards, the home ministry has followed a policy of...

West Bengal Industries Minister Nirupam Sen said here on Thursday that a unique comprehensive rehabilitation package for land-losers has been formulated and will be put in place in areas where industrial units are to come up. At an event where “letters of allotment” and “permissive possession certificates” were handed over to 13 investors for setting up units in south Bengal on a total of 1210.76 acres of land acquired by the...

Since the beginning of December last, 220 tenant farmers in the state have committed suicide or died of shock, crushed by mounting debts and loss of crops. Overall, the farmer death toll stands at a staggering 350-400. Though the fickle weather wreaked havoc, experts believe it's only partly to blame as several other factors have worked against the farming community. While economic expansion continues to bypass the farming community leaving...

Organized retail of packed food and raw food reduces prices of food for urban citizens and pays farmers a better price for the agricultural produce. It eliminates middle men and decision making at every other level. This is not rocket science. However, politicians refuse to do away with the WWII public distribution system in order to retain power at the district level. Well, for one thing, the format of the...