-Hindustan Times The Union Government has allowed charities and states to buy extra stocks of federally held foodgrains at a reserve but cheaper-than-market price as several migrant workers battle a food crisis. New Delhi: The Union Government has allowed charities and states to buy extra stocks of federally held foodgrains at a reserve but cheaper-than-market price as several migrant workers battle a food crisis. The federally run Food Corporation of India has reserved...

-India Spend Team The public distribution system (PDS) is meant to play a key role in disbursing Government support to the poorest Indians during the ongoing COVID-19 crisis. However, the system leaves more than 100 million people excluded from its reach, as per academics Jean Drèze, Reetika Khera and Meghana Mungikar, because the central Government uses 2011 population figures from the last census to calculate state-wise PDS coverage. Under the National Food...

-The Indian Express Amartya Sen, Raghuram Rajan, Abhijit Banerjee write: As it becomes clear that the lockdown will go on for quite a while, the biggest worry right now, by far, is that a huge number of people will be pushed into dire poverty or even starvation by the combination of the loss of their livelihoods and interruptions in the standard delivery mechanisms. We in India worry a lot about the possible...

-The Telegraph Provide emergency ration cards, universalise PDS in rural areas and urban slums, says Dreze India’s foodgrain stocks have never been so bountiful, yet the Government is struggling to ensure that no one remains hungry in the middle of the coronavirus pandemic that has sparked an unprecedented emergency involving jobless migrant workers, thousands of whom are stranded away from their homes. Stocks with Food Corporation of India was estimated to be around...

-TheWire.in 'Disaster management' has become the new vehicle for suspending the fundamental rights of the people and there is a danger that this may become the new normal even after the coronavirus threat has subsided. When the debate last week should have been over how quickly the lockdown can be lifted, several chief ministers, including KCR of Telangana has  – which has had a modest number of positive cases and deaths –...