-The Times of India In the next few days, India’s northern region, especially Delhi, is again likely to become among the most polluted PLAces on earth because a vast number of farmers in Punjab and Haryana have decided to continue their annual ritual of setting fire to paddy straw. This has brought back the spectre of smog choking the region despite the Centre doling out more than Rs 1,000 crore to the...

-The Indian Express This forecast, following a joint exercise by IIT Gandhinagar and the India Meteorological Department (IMD), for the first time, provides a country-wide soil moisture forecast at seven and 30-day lead times. New Delhi: With the rabi season around the corner, a countrywide forecast prepared at the end of the monsoon season suggests deficit soil moisture conditions are likely in Gujarat, Bihar, Jharkhand, Tamil Nadu and southern Andhra Pradesh. This forecast,...

-The Hindu Farmer Ghani Khan is a conservator at heart; his on-site exhibit has traditional strains of rice Mysuru: Armed with a degree in archaeology and museology from the University of Mysore, Ghani Khan of Kirugavalu in Malavalli taluk of Mandya district nurtured dreams of being a curator in a museum, conserving and showcasing heritage artefacts. But fate had other PLAns. He became a farmer, a family tradition, and his dreams of a...

-Mumbai Mirror The Modi government says it will double farmers’ real earnings by 2022, but so far, it has only delivered committees and reports. In early 2016, Prime Minister Narendra Modi promised to double farmers’ income by 2022, and the government subsequently set up an inter-ministerial committee led by Ashok Dalwai, additional secretary in the agriculture ministry, to prepare a roadmap. About two weeks ago, the committee submitted its fourteenth and final...

-The Indian Express For the Modi government and farmers, it’s not MSPs for rabi, but below-MSP rates for kharif crops now being marketed, that should really worry. New Delhi: Promising something is much easier than having the capacity to deliver. This is a reality that the Narendra Modi government may have to reckon with in the current kharif marketing season itself, even as it has announced a fresh round of minimum support...