-TheWire.in Environmentalist and water management expert Ravi Chopra says river inter-linking will sow the seeds for future conflicts between states. There is nothing new about the proposed river-interlinking project being pushed by the government, and this ‘unnecessary excess’ of a project will create more problems than it promises to solve, says environmentalist and water management expert, Dr Ravi Chopra, the director of People’s Science Institute, Dehradun and a managing trustee of the...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: The 2011 census brought Jhunjhunu in Rajasthan the ignominy of being the district with the lowest sex ratio of 837 girls per 1,000 boys among 33 districts of the state. Seven years on, the district is being hailed as a model with the sex ratio at birth (SRB) touching an impressive 955 girls per 1,000 boys. It is from here that Prime Minister Narendra Modi will...

-India Today Jaipur: After being stopped from entering Jaipur to register their protests against the Vasundhara Raje-led BJP regime, Rajasthan Kisan Sabha has decided to give the government a taste of its own medicine. The farmers, who had decided to lay siege around the Vidhan Sabha on February 22, have now threatened Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje that she and her ministers will not be allowed to enter villages in the state. Rajasthan Government,...

-Livemint.com Linking MSPs to a multiple of costs and ignoring other dynamics, such as demand and global prices, risks creating distortions and disincentivizing productivity Government policymaking seems to be making a volte-face from supporting consumers (by keeping food inflation low), to supporting producers (by raising food prices). In the 2018-19 Union budget, the government “decided to keep minimum support prices (MSP) for all unannounced crops of kharif at least at one-and-a-half times of...

-Livemint.com The positions of two non-official members representing farming community and one official member have been vacant for 2 years New Delhi: Following years of low crop prices and protests by farmers, the centre in its budget for 2018-19 promised to ensure remunerative prices for farmers through higher minimum support prices (MSPs). However, in the Commission for Agricultural Costs and Prices, or CACP— an office of the agriculture ministry mandated to recommend...