-IPS News TIKAMGARH: Eighty-year-old Chenabai Kushwaha sits on a charpoy under a neem tree in the village of Chitawar, located in the Tikamgarh district in the central Indian state of Madhya Pradesh, staring intently at a dictaphone. “Please sing a song for us,” urges the woman holding the voice recorder. Kushwaha obliges with a melancholy tune about an eight-year-old girl begging her father not to give her away in marriage. The melody melts...

-The Times of India AGRA: Hot on the heels of state food safety officials exposing presence of more-than-permissible levels of lead and monosodium glutamate (MSG) content in Nestle's instant noodle brand Maggi, food safety and drug administration (FSDA) in Agra has found presence of detergent in milk samples of Mother Dairy, which is owned by National Dairy Development Board of India. FSDA's designated officer Ramnaresh Yadav, who exposed the adulteration, told TOI,...

-The Telegraph Nagpur: Maharashtra's BJP-led government has put on hold confined field trials for genetically modified (GM) crops "until all doubts are cleared", following "objections from reputed members of society" including RSS affiliate Swadeshi Jagran Manch. No time bar has been specified for the restrictions, which come days before the onset of the monsoon and the start of the sowing season. The state agriculture department wrote to private and public sector companies on...

-The Economic Times NEW DELHI: Private forecasters are counting on temperature changes in the Indian Ocean to strengthen the monsoon current like it did in 1997, when rainfall was normal, despite a strong El Nino. While forecasters are divided about the monsoon outlook, experts say that India has become less vulnerable to monsoon rain as the share of Winter-sown crops has risen over the years, while only 40% of rural households...

-Hindustan Times India’s June-September monsoon, the lifeblood of Asia’s third-largest economy, will most likely be “deficient” this year with the met department downgrading its forecast from 93% to 88%, earth sciences minister Harsh Vardhan said on Tuesday.   The India Meteorological Department’s (IMD) revision -- which had forecast “below normal” monsoon in April -- will potentially toughen challenges for the Narendra Modi government already battling a farm crisis triggered by unseasonal rains in...