-Frontline.in   The Modi government has apparently realised that the private sector is not up to the task of driving growth. It hopes to fund its neoliberal dream of India becoming the fastest-growing emerging market through a combination of off-Budget borrowing and drastic expenditure reduction in key social sectors. IT will soon be a year since the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government under Prime Minister Narendra Modi took office at the Centre....

-The Indian Express Rural wages in India have registered an average annual growth of 3.8 per cent in November, the lowest since July 2005, according to Labour Bureau data. The 3.8 per cent year-on-year increase is a significant drop relative to the two-digit growth rates prevailing until June, and the peak 20 per cent-plus levels of 2011 (see graph). "The numbers confirm the findings in our mid-year economic analysis that inflation is...

-FirstPost.com Uncertainty over the supply of subsidised foodgrain to over 19 lakh families in Assam whose livelihoods are linked to work in the tea gardens is threatening to not only spark dissent among workers but has got the industry leaders worried. To understand the impact, consider the case of Deepak Daori and Monica Daori - both workers at Mokalbari Tea Estate in Dibrugarh district. "We are worried that the our monthly ration might...

-The Business Standard   How a law to conserve groundwater led to a better paid and better organised migrant workforce Ludhiana: For some years now, Punjab's fields have lain fallow through the searing dry heat of May; but come June's steamy humidity, small bands of lithe, slender men from Bihar fan out across the waterlogged paddy fields, transplanting rice saplings with fluid efficiency. Bihar's paddy planters have frequented Punjab since the 1960s when rice...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: Agricultural GDP is likely to grow by over 5% this year thanks to the most abundant rains in nearly two decades, a government thinktank has forecast. If the prediction turns out right, it could help tame food inflation, provide a much-needed boost to rural incomes and a knock-on effect on other sectors of the economy. The demand for two-wheelers, tractors and mobiles, in particular, could rise...