-CivilSocietyOnline.com For the past decade state governments have launched a series of Internet-based initiatives to deliver services more efficiently. Technology has been seen as the best way of bypassing red tape and corruption in the system to reach the poor directly with benefits. Beneficiaries are identified through biometrics and a series of tech solutions like smart cards, micro ATMs and so on. The result of these efforts is that India is...

The budgetary support to interest subvention scheme has increased by almost 14 times between 2006-07 and 2016-17. However, the much-touted subsidised short-term credit scheme provides little help to the small and marginal farmers, apart from tenant farmers. According to the Committee on Medium-term Path on Financial Inclusion, which submitted its report in December 2015, the interest subvention scheme suffers from 3 types of defects: i. Subsidised credit may not be...

Agricultural insurance is supposed to protect farmers from financial hardships and risks when crop losses and damage takes place due to extreme weather events such as drought, cyclone, hailstorms, flood etc. However, in reality this does not hold true in India. Due to the failure of crop insurance schemes in India, there has been a deepening of agrarian crisis and rural distress in the recent times, particularly in the backdrop of...

-Frontline Changing the way you count changes the count. THE total number of farmer suicides in the country since 1995 crossed the 3,00,000-mark in 2014. However, the 2014 data are not comparable with 19 earlier years of farm suicide data. This is because of major changes in the methodology of the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB). With the new parameters, the number of farmer suicides in 2014 falls to 5,650. That is...

-The Indian Express India’s largest nutrient maker tells The Indian Express how 11 crore farmers can directly receive subsidy now going to the industry. Direct Benefit Transfer (DBT) of fertiliser subsidy to farmers is an eminently feasible proposition and the Narendra Modi government should lose no time in going ahead with its implementation, says US Awasthi of the Indian Farmers Fertiliser Cooperative (Iffco). “People interested in stalling DBT are giving all sorts of...