There are numerous debilitating factors that disallow Indian agriculture from growing to its potential. The most critical of them, which, ironically, are not receiving due attention, are related to land. Not only is the availability of land for farming shrinking, but its quality and fertility are also waning. Agricultural holdings are getting smaller and turning uneconomical to operate. The much-hyped land reforms have, right from the beginning, been misdirected. These have...

With global efforts to end child labour showing mixed results, United Nations agencies are urging greater action to achieve the goal of eliminating the scourge by 2016. The latest report by the International Labour Organization (ILO) says that if current trends continue, the 2016 target will not be reached and a renewed push to end child labour is urgently needed. As millions of people around the world focus their attention...

They may be at the bottom of all social indicators but most Naxalite-affected districts have better scores to show in the rural job scheme than areas that are not under the insurgency shadow. The main reason was better implementation, the direct result of the resolve by the state and central governments to counter the influence of the rebels through a development surge. The other reason, rarely stated but tacitly acknowledged, is...

Why is Madhya Pradesh ranked so low in the Millennium Development Goals like child and maternal mortality, extreme poverty, hunger and safe drinking water? Social sector allocation has increased only during the last few years. Before 2005, there wasn’t enough money allocated to it when compared to poverty alleviation schemes. Also, it takes time for the benefits of the allocations to reach people and for real change to manifest itself....

Union Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee will head the promised Group of Ministers (GoM) that will examine the modalities of enumeration of caste in Census 2011, senior government sources told TheHindu. The GoM was constituted on June 4, nine days after the Union Cabinet took a decision to do so. Its 10 other members are the representatives of all the Congress' partners in the United Progressive Alliance (UPA): Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar, Defence...