-The Indian Express India’s citizenry is well and truly into a battle for constitutional values, which must be fought, most of all, with non-violent determination and vigour. In the historical scale of rioting, where do the recent Delhi riots belong? And what is their larger political significance? The first question is statistical. During early to mid-1990s, Steven Wilkinson, now teaching at Yale, and I, set up a database for all recorded Hindu-Muslim riots...

-Economic and Political Weekly Though the 16-point action plan for agriculture laid down in the 2020 Union Budget continues prioritising subsidies and safety nets over agricultural investments, it does not make any fundamental improvements in the allocations towards these heads. Please click here to access the article. ...

-Economic and Political Weekly The Union Budget of 2020 is conspicuous by its non-recognition of the ongoing and widely discussed slowdown of the economy, let alone its impact on the different sections of the people. Given the negative growth in employment and consumption in the rural economy, the budget seems like a cruel joke on the plight of the poor, in general, and women, in particular. Instead of measures for boosting...

-The Hindu Aadhaar-based biometric authentication did not reduce PDS leakages, finds Jharkhand-based empirical study “Aadhaar has curtailed leakages of government subsidies... Through Aadhaar, savings worth ₹90,000 crore have accrued to the government,” said Ajay Bhushan Pandey, then CEO of the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) and current Revenue Secretary, in UIDAI’s 2017-18 annual report. But not so fast, say Professors Karthik Muralidharan, Paul Niehaus and Sandip Sukthankar. They have just published a...

-The Indian Express The recent tweaks to the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana, including making it 100% voluntary and capping premiums at 30%, are going to be a game-changer. The Centre has recently revamped the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana (PMFBY) that will have far-reaching impact on the implementation of this flagship crop insurance scheme. Launched in the 2016 kharif season, PMFBY makes the insurance companies liable for full risk coverage. Farmers...