-The Indian Express Chhattisgarh, Bengal and UP emerge frontrunners in extending MSP-plus support to farmers Call it the impact of the ensuing national elections: Governmental procurement of rice, the country’s largest crop by planted area, looks set to surpass 40 million tonnes (mt) for the time ever in the current marketing year that runs from October to September. That would work out to more than a third of the total projected...

-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...

-The Hindu Steps like limited procurement, boosting productivity and consolidating land holdings can help reduce agrarian distress Recently, there has been active discussion on the strategies addressing farm distress. There are media reports that the ‘interim Budget’ may focus on the farm sector among other things. Agrarian distress, in the present context, is mainly in terms of low agricultural prices and, consequently, poor farm incomes. Low productivity in agriculture and related supply...

-The Hindu In a response to an RTI query, the CAG said: “Audit Report is under preparation. Therefore, no information can be provided in this stage.” The Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) has not yet completed its audit report regarding purchase of Rafale aircraft, according to its response to an RTI query this week. This erodes the basis of the Supreme Court’s December 2018 judgement on the Rafale case, according to RTI...

-Newsclick.in The crisis of falling onion prices is killing farmers in Maharashtra. The highest onion growing district, Nasik, has witnessed 18 farmers suicides within the first 20 days of 2019. Last week the photo of a farmer lying dead on the onion crop in his farm went viral on social media in Maharashtra, bringing the already deepening crisis of onion price into headlines again. Reactions started pouring in from all corners. The...