-TheWire.in The Indian farmer is not just a poor, helpless victim who deserves a waiver because he cannot pay. The root cause of the debt trap is that his income has not increased with rising expenditure due to state policies. As Punjab joins the list of states to declare farm loan waivers, the political scales are now heavily tilted in favour of this idea. The government of Telangana, followed by Andhra Pradesh,...

-GovernanceNow.com As farmers protests take centre stage across the country, Swaraj Party convenor explains the ecological, economic and existential crisis behind this unrest. * We have recently seen farmers from Tamil Nadu protesting in the national capital. Then Maharashtra farmers protested, deciding not to send their produce to cities. The agitation has now reached Madhya Pradesh, leading to killings. Why there is sudden farmers’ unrest in the country? I think we...

Paytm's founder Vijay Shekhar Sharma was in the news recently for signing a deal to purchase a Rs. 82 crore worth property in Lutyens’ Delhi. He is credited with the growth of Paytm's mobile wallet services, which is currently being used by over 220 million users across the country. Although Paytm was launched in 2010, the popularity of its mobile wallet services and payment gateway among the ordinary citizens grew...

-The Indian Express Demonetisation may not have hit agriculture production but it is the cause for the current unrest When demonetisation happened, many, including this writer, thought the decision, taken at the start of rabi plantings in November, would significantly impact farm production. We were proved wrong. Good monsoon rains, after successive drought years, besides the timely onset of winter conducive to germination, turned out to be strong motivations for farmers...

-Livemint.com Bank loans to rural India were the most affected, but other parts of the country also saw a deceleration in credit growth, RBI data shows It is, of course, well known that the growth of bank credit slowed in the second half of 2016-17 due to demonetisation. Reserve Bank of India (RBI) data shows that as on 30 September 2016, the annual rate of growth of bank credit was 12.1%. That...