While the Maharashtra government must be relieved that Swabhimani Shetkari Sanghatana leader and Kolhapur MP Raju Shetty ended his five-day fast in Baramati on Saturday, after it agreed to a sugarcane procurement price hike, many wonder why the same state ignores the plight of its cotton farmers. In the same duration that Shetty sat on a fast 22 debt-ridden, Vidarbha cotton farmers committed suicide. One of these, Rajendra Lahiti of Dhamangaon,...

Many people including members of Team Anna have expressed reservations about the way in which their campaign has been developing, and some have even resigned. This raises questions about the real aim of the leadership around Anna. Is it really what it is proclaimed to be? Is the aim to get the Jan Lokpal Bill passed by parliament? Team Anna has repeatedly stated that they have just a one-point agenda: to get...

-The Telegraph   Sharad Pawar’s hometown Baramati was shut down today by farmers demanding higher remunerative prices for sugarcane. The protest by the farmers has sent a strong political message to the ruling Congress-NCP government. Baramati is the seat of Maharashtra’s powerful and influential sugar belt that controls the state politics. Shops and establishments were closed down as hundreds of sugarcane farmers camping here for the fourth consecutive day intensified their protest and organised rasta...

Union rural development minister Jairam Ramesh’s suggestion to bring the national rural employment guarantee scheme (NREGS) under the state rural development department has widened the rift between the Congress and the Nationalist Congress Party (NCP). Jairam wrote to chief minister Prithviraj Chavan, suggesting that the EGS be brought under the state rural development department (RDD) for effective implementation in September this year, but in a reply, dated October 7, Chavan bluntly...

-The Hindustan Times   Rural development Jayant Patil on Tuesday said that implementation of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) should be in the hands of his department instead of the Congress-controlled Water Conservation and Employment Guarantee Scheme (EGS) department, in the “best interests of the state.” Patil statement comes in the wake of Union rural development minister Jairam Ramesh’s missive to chief minister Prithviraj Chavan, stating that the implementation...