-ThePrint.in Employment in India rose from 394.6 million in August to 404.2 million in September, and while the numbers are still below pre-Covid levels, the increase is encouraging. India’s unemployment rate dropped sharply to 6.4 per cent in September from 8.3 per cent in August. This was the lowest unemployment rate in the past four years. The fall in unemployment was seen across both rural and urban regions. Alongside the decline in the...

-The Telegraph The airbrushing of the Indian economy is damaging The latest Monthly Economic Review from the ministry of finance gives the reader a great deal of comfort by indicating that all is well with the Indian economy. If there is any cause for concern at all, it is from external economic and political shocks: events like the Federal Reserve in the United States of America raising interest rates, or Russia invading...

-Ideas for India The share of bank credit extended to MSMEs increased dramatically during the pandemic. In this post, Harsh Vardhan discusses the the government guarantee of bank loans as a possible driver of this growth. He outlines the current policy of providing credit against collateral, and the constraints MSMEs face while borrowing– which leads to decreased investment and firm productivity. He argues that the learnings from the credit guarantee scheme...

-Moneycontrol.com Measures like assistance for fallow land cultivation, upland cultivation, and conversion of single crop to double crop have increased productivity. Though paddy farmers are still struggling with rising cost of production and procurement delays, they get a daily wage of Rs 700, against Rs 200-300 in other states. Paddy farmers in Kerala have something to cheer amidst the ongoing row between the Kerala government and the rice millers over procurement. Rice production...

-Business Standard "The global goal of ending extreme poverty by 2030 is likely to be missed: by then, about 600 million people will remain in abject poverty. A major course correction is needed," Indermit Gill said. About 56 million Indians may have plunged into extreme poverty in 2020 as a result of the pandemic, increasing the global tally by 71 million and making it the worst year for poverty reduction since World...