-The Hindu Held to account by the Supreme Court, the Central government is using opaque methods to change the key provisions of the employment guarantee scheme and make it targeted instead of universal. There is a pithy saying in Hindi that the elephant has two sets of teeth, one for show and the other to eat. This seems an apt description of the approach of the Narendra Modi government towards the implementation...

-The Hindu Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh announces it will not take part in the strike. The Left affiliated central trade unions will go ahead with a nationwide strike on Friday, even as the Centre on Tuesday announced sops in a bid to placate them. The peace offering includes a hike in the minimum wage for unskilled non-Agricultural Workers in central public sector units from Rs. 246 to Rs. 350 a day and formation of...

-The Indian Express Farm incomes may not revive despite good monsoon. There are new challenges for policymakers. India’s per capita calorie demand has been falling for at least the last 30 years. Most people do a double-take when they hear that. One can’t debate the fact much: National Sample Surveys every five to seven years have documented this. What we can debate are the reasons behind this: In their 2009 paper Angus...

-The Hindu Kerala today is not generating enough jobs to meet the expectations of educated Keralites entering the labour market. Changing this is vital and doable Kerala’s development model is in focus yet again as the newly elected Left Democratic Front government is in the process of evolving a vision for the State’s economy. On the one hand, Kerala has made spectacular achievements in land reforms, education, and health since its formation. Amartya...

-Frontline A noteworthy study that provides much-needed insights into the nature and severity of the farm crisis in Punjab. There have been many studies on agrarian distress and farmer suicides in different parts of India in the last decade, including in Punjab. Most of the studies focus on a profile of the victims, mostly landowning farmers, and reasons thereof, with a sample of such farmers. In this context, this book makes a...