-Centre for Budget and Governance Accountability (CBGA) The Interim Union Budget 2019-20, the last budget presented by the incumbent government, comes at a time when the economy is beset with myriad problems. Among the various challenges facing the economy, perhaps the most critical are those related to the acute agrarian distress, burgeoning unemployment and slowing down of the economy. While it is true that many of these problems began prior to...

-TimesNowNews.com (Mirror Now) Despite paying premiums of Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bhima Yojana, farmers in Madhya Pradesh are facing a crisis as the payout under the crop insurance scheme are rare and farmers fail to their cover losses. Bhopal: Despite paying premiums of the crop insurance scheme, farmers in Madhya Pradesh are facing a crisis. The government had launched the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bhima Yojana in 2016 precisely to address crops ravaged by...

-The Indian Express Direct income support for farmers is too late, too little The hopes of farmers for a meaningful package from the Modi government have evaporated after the announcements in the Union budget. The proposed Rs 6,000 annual direct income support to small and marginal farmers is a drop in the ocean. States like Telangana and Odisha have done much better with their Rythu Bandhu and Kalia schemes respectively. After...

-The Hindu The Interim Budget makes clear the class hierarchy in the Modi government’s scheme of populism Interim Budget 2019 has sought to make amends for all the wrongs of almost five years of the Narendra Modi government. For example, the debilitating impact of demonetisation on the informal sector that employs nearly 90% of the workforce had long been suspected on the basis of anecdotal evidence. The findings of the National Sample...

-Newsclick.in Income support should not lead to the State washing its hands of the poor after handing them a certain sum of money whose real value too would dwindle over time. With Congress president Rahul Gandhi’s announcement recently at Raipur that his party had taken a “historic decision” to introduce an income guarantee scheme for the poor, and with the general anticipation that the Narendra Modi government’s last budget will also announce...