-The Hindu Managers of around 3,000 privately-run markets are to meet and protest new rules that ban sale of animals for slaughter at cattle markets Fridays are festive days at Pachokhara. For nearly half-a-century now, farmers, cattle-rearers and tradesmen have made the weekly trip to the cricket stadium-sized grounds of the Upadhyay family— prominent local land-owners — to trade cattle. A dirt road splits the ground into a section for buffaloes and another for...

-The Telegraph Bhopal: The turbaned, white-haired, kurta-dhoti-wearing "Tauji" figures are there too, but one outstanding feature of the current farmer agitation in Madhya Pradesh are its jeans-clad, smartphone-wielding spearheads. If the veteran "Kakkaji" Shiv Kumar Sharma is the public face of the movement, which lacks a central leadership, much of the spadework is being done by a band of young, bilingual, stats-savvy and largely apolitical agriculture graduates. Their leader Kedar Sirohi, who is...

-The Hindu From a persisting cash crunch due to demonetisation to a price free fall because of a bumper produce, it’s a big bag of woes for farmers in Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra. Mahesh Langa and Jayant Sriram report on the gathering storm as their protests for a fairer deal threaten to escalate Abhishek Patidar, 19, had just passed his Class 11 exam this year with dreams of becoming a doctor. His...

-The Telegraph Bhopal (Madhya Pradesh): Chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan today invited the leaders of the agitating farmers for talks tomorrow, while arson attacks continued at many places in Madhya Pradesh and another death was reported from protest hub Mandsaur. Ghanashyam Dhakad, a 26-year-old farmer, was said to be on his way to a temple last night when some policemen allegedly thrashed him with sticks. He was declared dead this morning at...

-The Hindu Dumping of solid waste has badly affected five river basins in the State Thiruvananthapuram (Kerala): Microbial contamination due to sewage discharge and dumping of solid waste has affected the water quality in five river basins in Kerala, highlighting the need for stricter monitoring and management of water resources. The findings have been published by the Centre for Water Resources Development and Management (CWRDM) based on a study of the Mogral, Chittari...