-Livemint.com BJP-led central government has raised import duties on a range of edible oils, ahead of the crucial Gujarat assembly elections New Delhi: Ahead of the crucial Gujarat assembly elections, the centre last week raised import duties on a range of edible oils, in a bid to support growers who are bearing losses due to plunging domestic prices. On 17 November, India, the largest importer of edible oils globally, raised import duties on...

-The Indian Express Onion farmers have suffered even in a bumper crop year. Needed: Scientific storage facilities, a judicious trade policy. Onions are, once again, in the news. Last week, retail prices touched Rs 50/kg in several markets, and wholesale prices touched Rs 30/kg in major onion markets like Lasalgaon in Maharashtra. This is not the first time that onion prices have spiked. Almost every alternate year, this roller-coaster of boom and...

-Livemint.com While investment demand was anyway weak when the NDA came to power in 2014, private consumption has also started decelerating due to demonetisation New Delhi: The National Democratic Alliance (NDA) won a landslide in the 2014 general election with the promise of fast-tracking economic growth and creating jobs. It replaced the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government that was mired in corruption scandals and had mismanaged the economy. Three years on,...

-The Indian Express Protests by the people against inequality are producing governments that move exactly in the opposite direction We all know that the world is an unequal place, both across and within countries. We also know that across the world, people are expressing their anger and disgust at this inequality. This is increasingly revealed in extreme and often paradoxical political results. In the US, a vote against the establishment has just...

-Frontline.in In the latest Global Hunger Index, India is bracketed in the category of countries where hunger levels are “serious”. But the policy responses on hunger and malnutrition in the country have been inadequate and faulty. In the second week of October, a few media reports in India highlighted significant data pertaining to global hunger. The International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) had released its Global Hunger Index (GHI), rating 118...