-Newsclick.in As India celebrates its 75th Independence Day, there is a record harvest of foodgrains; but why are so many people hungry? India has reaped an all-time high food grain harvest for 2020-21 of nearly 309 million tonnes (MT), or nearly 31 crore tonnes, according to latest estimates by the agriculture ministry. This was propelled by record harvests of wheat (109.5 MT), rice (122.3 MT), nutri/coarse cereals (51.2 MT) and pulses (25.7...
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Modi Govt’s Policy to Reduce Oil Imports: Subsidise the Rich, Burden the Poor! -Ayaskant Das
-Newsclick.in Rice meant for the poor will be sold at subsidised rates to privately-owned ethanol distilleries. The industries will be given cheap loans and exempted from Environmental Clearances. Is the Modi government subsidising the rich at the cost of the poor by diverting foodgrains meant for the most impoverished sections of the population to private industries for producing alcohol for India’s ethanol blended petrol programme? There’s more: For manufacturing ethanol, foodgrains will not...
More »It’s time to protect the poor and the migrants from rising edible oil prices
In his Mann ki Baat address to the nation on 30th May, 2021, Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi appreciated the fact that the farmers received "more than the minimum support price (MSP) for mustard" pertaining to the rabi production. One can easily guess from this statement of the PM that the mustard growers in Haryana (and elsewhere) preferred to sell their produce to private traders in the open market instead...
More »The inadequate food safety net -CP Chandrasekhar and Jayati Ghosh
-The Hindu Business Line/ NetworkIdeas.org With India experiencing a severe second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic, forcing decentralized lockdowns, a crisis of loss of jobs and livelihoods and resulting hunger is being reported from across the country. A reluctant central government has, therefore, been forced to revive the Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Anna Yojana (PMGKAY), to distribute 5 kilograms of free foodgrain per person per month to the approximately 80 crore...
More »When Aadhaar-related problems lead to denial of rations and benefits: what the data show -Shreyas Sardesai
-The Indian Express Have people been denied foodgrains due to non-possession of an Aadhaar ID or because their Aadhaar biometric details didn't match? Here's data from a Lokniti-CSDS study The Supreme Court recently asked the Centre to respond to allegations made in a PIL by a Dalit woman from Jharkhand that 3 crore ration cards have been cancelled in the country because of the insistence on Aadhaar linkage and biometric authentication, and...
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