-NDTV.com The survey was conducted to find out the total number of forced conversions but ended up revealing that no forced conversions have taken place Chitradurga, Karnataka: While the BJP government in Karnataka continues to make allegations of a rise in forced conversions, an official survey carried out in one of the districts that have been subject to these allegations raises questions on the validity of the claim.  Thippeswamy, a Tahasildar who surveyed...

-TheWire.in A claim of an 8.4% real GDP growth rate has little relevance even as rural India battles plummeting wage levels, depleted incomes and widespread unemployment. With the release of the GDP figures for the quarter ending September, the government machinery has been in full swing advancing the narrative that economic growth is indeed back on track. However, sorely missing from these narratives is the inconvenient factoid on the currently dismal state of...

-Hindustan Times The study has been authored by Aditi Roy, PHFI Crop diversity is thought to have small, positive impacts on dietary diversity among farming households, particularly when market access is restricted. Policy responses to the Covid-19 pandemic severely restricted market access. To date, no study has explored the relationship between crop and dietary diversity in this context. To address this gap, we used longitudinal data collected from 833 farmers across 12...

-TheWire.in The auctions let millers earn a bloated revenue of at least Rs 4,600 crore in four years from milling over 5.4 lakh tonnes of raw pulses, hammering government coffers and possibly the quality of daal, show documents. New Delhi: The Narendra Modi government allowed millers to fatten themselves on tonnes of pulses meant for the poor by turning an auction procedure on its head. The Reporters’ Collective’s examination of auction archives shows...

-IdeasforIndia.com The Centre has sought an additional Rs. 25,000 crore as funding for MNREGA (Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act). Based on simple calculations using official data, Ashwini Kulkarni contends that the actual fund requirement is in fact much higher. As the pandemic continues to adversely impact rural livelihoods, the government should allocate sufficient funds to MNREGA, in order to honour the work-on-demand guarantee. For over a month, national and local...