-The Hindu Over the years we have lost over a lakh varieties of native rice. One district in Odisha is rediscovering some of them It is a balmy winter morning when I meet Kamli Bataraa, an ebullient Adivasi farmer, at her home in Belugan, in southern Odisha’s Koraput district. There is a hum across the village from the threshing of just-harvested paddy. When I ask Kamli about the rice varieties she grows,...

-Livemint.com The trajectory of wealth concentration in the country, not just the levels of recently estimated inequality, is important A flurry of estimates regarding Indian inequality have captured public interest recently. Whether one believes the wealth inequality numbers presented by Credit Suisse or the distributional income accounts by Lucas Chancel and Thomas Piketty, evidence seems to state that India has high economic disparities. But inequality is to be expected in a developing...

-The Hindu The former Attorney General about recent landmark judgments of the Supreme Court, the credibility of the court, and the sedition law Former Attorney General of India, Soli Sorabjee, was given the Padma Vibhushan 15 years back for his defence of the freedom of expression and protection of human rights. Now, at 87, Mr. Sorabjee says he is looking forward to making his arguments in a pending case on Aadhaar. Excerpts...

-The Times of India BHOPAL: Challenging the Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) machines, which are used during polling to verify that the vote cast by a person goes to the correct candidate, would land a person in jail, if it is found that the machine is working fine. The issue has come to light as the election commission is planning to make the people in MP aware of the machine...

-TheWire.in Private moneylenders are a major source of loans across the region, and with the collapse of banking in rural areas, their role has only grown. Baliram Kadpe is critical of the Maharashtra government. “Farmers do not get the minimum support price [for their crops, from the state],” he says with concern. “And it is tedious for them to acquire crop loans.”  Kadpe believes if the state ensures that farmers have access...