-Livemint.com Rural India was battling economic difficulties even before the pandemic. The pandemic-induced lockdown increased hardships even further. The historic contraction in India’s gross domestic product (GDP) figure for the June-ended quarter has raised several questions on what the future holds, and what that contraction has meant for ordinary people. Macro-economic statistics can often fail to capture the diverse realities of a country as large as India, and hence it is useful...

-The Hindu The fees make up for almost 20% of their total cost of education, says NSO report on education One in five students in India supplements school education with private coaching, including almost one in three at the secondary school level or Classes 9 and 10. Private coaching fees make up almost 20% of the total cost of education for those in secondary and higher secondary school. In some States, such as...

-The Hindu Evidence of significant disparity in access to online schooling during COVID-19 Schools across the country have now been closed for six months due to COVID-19, but this means vastly different things for different people. For the child in urban Himachal Pradesh, where Internet penetration is higher than 70%, it likely means online schooling, Zoom classes and digital textbooks. For the child in rural Odisha, where less than 6% of households...

-The Indian Express The contraction seen in first-quarter GDP data is severe, but not unexpected. What should be done — or not done – at the level of govt policy so that the economy gets a chance to rebound as quickly as possible? * How should one read the first-quarter GDP data and the contraction by 23.9%? What signal does it offer for the future? And does it give any idea of...

-The Hindu Business Line The government, market and collectives should have worked in tandem to develop resilience of economic institutions during the slowdown in India The sharp downfall in the economic growth rate could be attributable to a lack of resilience of Indian economy. Only fiscal and monetary policies may not halt the downfall of the economy. Collective organisations, including NGOs, have played an important role in Consumption and income-smoothing. The downfall...