-The Hindustan Times Recently, at a rally of gram panchayat chiefs, agriculture minister Sharad Pawar told the audience, “Improving the well-being of farmers is difficult unless agriculture sheds some of its population. At least one member from the farmer’s family should seek livelihood opportunities outside agriculture.” He has often made this appeal to farmers in Maharashtra, pointing out how rich industrial countries have a small proportion of their labour force in...

-The Hindustan Times Setting a precedent, over 150 khaps from different parts of Haryana held a maha panchayat in Bibipur on Saturday and resolved to wipe out female foeticide from the state. Women khap members also attended the panchayat. Several khap leaders including Sunil Jaglan, sarpanch of Bibipur, Om Prakash Mann, president of the Akhil Bharatiya Jaat Mahasabha, Dharampal Chhot, president of the All India Jaat Arakshan Sangharsh Samiti, and Dr Attar...

To replace ‘Dalit’ with ‘SC’, as the Thorat panel recommends, is to be inaccurate A commission led by S.K. Thorat, and charged with reviewing NCERT political science textbooks in the wake of the cartoon controversy, has singled out a specific word in the text for removal. All instances of the word “Dalit”, it is recommended, should be replaced with “Scheduled Caste” (SC). The blogosphere is rife with speculation on the motivation...

-Inclusion.in There is good news. And there’s bad news. The good news first. There’s been a bumper wheat crop and the granaries are overflowing. And the bad news? Where do we begin? A lot of that grain will rot. Millions will still remain hungry. Heavily in debt and distressed, farmers are committing suicide. Food prices are soaring. There’s more… Farmers don’t have money. Their land is too small and isn’t yielding much. Fertilisers and...

-Live Mint Realized prices for the farm sector continue to soften even though the government has raised the minimum support prices by over 20% Like every year the government has hiked minimum support prices to help the farmers realize good returns in early June, but India’s rural growth story is expected to run out of steam because of falling realizations of farmers and limited policy support, according to a recent report by...