-PTI * The scheme was launched on 28 August, 2014, with an aim to provide universal access to banking facilities to people in the country * The total balance in over 36.06 crore PMJDY accounts was at Rs.1,00,495.94 crore as on 3 July New Delhi: Deposits in bank accounts opened under Jan Dhan scheme, launched about five years ago by the Modi-government, have crossed the Rs.1 lakh crore mark. As per the latest finance...

-PTI New Delhi: The RSS-affiliated SJM on Sunday demanded ban on use of glyphosate, a commonly used herbicide, which it claimed to be carcinogenic. Swadeshi Jagran Manch's co-convener Ashwani Mahajan said soon the organisation will approach Home Ministry and will submit a memorandum in this regard. In 2015, International Agency for Research in Cancer (IARC), a body under the World Health Organization, had found in its research that glyphosate is probably carcinogenic, Mahajan...

-Newsclick.in “Our population today is around 136 crore. Where will you get food grains for them through zero budget farming? This is sheer madness.” There is an inherent seductive charm to the term zero budget natural farming, for it makes the arduous occupation of agriculture appear beguilingly simple, an economic proposition without any risk or even requirement of capital. Coined by the Vidarbha-based farmer, Subhash Palekar, who was bestowed with the Padma...

-Down to Earth The method was promoted as low-cost investment on part of farmers, but huge amounts are being raised for statewide implementation Andhra Pradesh has played a leading role in promoting agroecological farming in the past two decades. The Community Managed Sustainable Agriculture (CMSA) initiative of the state is often cited as a major intervention which encouraged farmers to gradually move away from chemical-intensive farming. However, despite such efforts, just 1...

-The Hindu The national bar against hate crime has Been lowered, but resolute corrective action is possible Once again, the first weeks of the Narendra Modi administration have Been marked by hate crimes — two Muslim men beaten by mobs in Jharkhand and Mumbai, demanding they shout ‘Jai Shri Ram’, one so mercilessly that he died. Another man, a tribal, lynched in Tripura on suspicion of being a cattle thief. Most recently,...