-DNA Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act, popularly knowns as NREGA, is the most romantic and largest development project in human history. It is extremely popular and invited widespread hatred. It embodies remarkable scope for alienated people and effortless corruption for powerful people at the lower level. The amount spent on it over the last nine years is about Rs3.50 lakh crore. The average number of jobs generated per year...

-The Indian Express I recently witnessed protests in Berlin, against industrialised farming and the planned free-trade agreement between the European Union and the United States, under the banner "We Are Fed Up". Trade issues resonate across Europe, but in India, farmers are oblivious to the inevitable consequences of trade agreements. However, the government seems keen to address issues related to farmers. Yet, success on the farm front can be delusional if...

-The Hindu While liberalisation's backers are not squeamish in admitting that democracy is an impediment to the free market economic model, farmers who are dispossessed of land argue that they are undercompensated and that the profit of private companies is not a public purpose Since it was passed by Parliament in September 2013, the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement Act (LARR) has been criticised from...

-Outlook A parsing of the recent expert report on food security reveals that most of its solutions do not meet the greater public good. The BJP's election manifesto had stated "that ‘universal food security' is integral to national security. BJP will take steps to ensure that the benefits of the scheme reach the common man and that the right to food does not remain an act on paper or a political...

-GRISTMedia.com In the course of my work as part of a team set up to look into the socio-economic status of Adivasi communities, there were several things I learned about the Land Acquisition Act, 2013, and the amendments to it. Here are some important questions about land and the Act that we should be asking: * What is the State's relationship to land and its citizens? This a key question - and one...