-Scroll.in In Telangana, large landholders are benefiting disproportionately from the scheme. In Odisha, families of ministers were on initial beneficiary lists. Early on January 25, Saroj Kumar Sahu and Manu Patel, two farmers from a western Odisha village, boarded a bus with around 10 others from their village to travel across the state to Puri. They were among thousands of farmers from the state’s 147 Assembly constituencies who were chosen to attend...

-IndiaWaterPortal.org Calculating water availability and crop budgeting can prevent over-extraction of groundwater and mounting farm debt. At 42 years, Bhagwat Ghagare seems young. But he is old enough to have seen his village prosper and decline many times. Farming had traditionally been small and distress migration rampant at Kumbharwadi in Ahmednagar district of Maharashtra. Between 1998 and 2002, a non-profit organisation, Watershed Organisation Trust (WOTR), initiated a work related to rainwater harvesting...

-The Indian Express CEO Surendra Kumar did not respond to calls for comment on the BJD allegation. BJP leader Pratap Sarangi, however, said: “They (BJD) are desperate and know they will be defeated. That is why they are attacking the CEO Odisha.” Bhubaneswar: The ruling BJD Monday alleged that the Odisha Chief Electoral Officer had stopped implementation of the Krushak Assistance for Livelihood and Income Augmentation (Kalia) scheme, the state government’s...

-The Hindu Decision to stop the scheme for now was based on opinion that unlike other schemes announced in the budget, this scheme entails cash Transfer to beneficiaries, “which could sway them weeks before polling.” Bengaluru: The farm loan waiver scheme of the Janata Dal (Secular)-Congress coalition government has been stalled temporarily by the Election Commission of India after the model code of conduct for the Lok Sabha election came into force. The...

-The Hindu Isolated innovations are not enough to stop cases of custodial torture In May 2017, addressing representatives from countries at the UN’s Human Rights Council, the then Attorney General of India said, “The concept of torture is completely alien to our culture and it has no place in the governance of the nation.” Last week in Sitamarhi district, Bihar, two families received the bodies of their two sons from the police. The...