-The Indian Express The women organisations also demanded a gender-based segregated data for women and men farmers. Ahmedabad: An umbrella group of more than 40 NGOs on Tuesday submitted a 12-point representation to the state government demanding agricultural schemes to be more women farmer sensitive. The Working Group for Women and Land Ownership (WGWLO) has demanded a special and separate budgetary provision for women farmers, besides seeking agricultural schemes that are designed...

-Networkideas.org In recent times, the clamour for formalising economic activity, or shrinking its unorganised component and expanding the organised, has been heard from diverse sources. There are those who want formalisation to occur because the unorganised sector is seen as being largely outside the direct and indirect tax net, depriving the government of much needed resources. Hence, for example, one feature seen as favouring the Goods and Services Tax regime is...

-Livemint.com/ Bloomberg Foreign exchange reserves dropped by $5.14 billion in the seven days ended October 12, the biggest weekly decline since November 2011, as the RBI stepped up action to prop up the rupee Mumbai: India made the biggest dent in its foreign exchange reserves in seven years as the central bank stepped up action to prop up Asia’s worst-performing currency. Reserves dropped by $5.14 billion in the seven days ended October 12,...

-The Hindu The draft report of the Murli Manohar Joshi-led Estimates Committee on “measuring growth, employment and income” asks the government on how it can address the critical issue of unemployment if it does not have “real time” and “holistic” data. A report by a parliamentary panel headed by BJP MP Murli Manohar Joshi, questioning the reliability of employment data collected by the government, has been stalled following protests by other BJP...

-Livemint.com The production of ‘mahua’ is finally entering the formal economy as new initiatives seek to upscale this indigenous drink, selling it across the country and even the globe It is a cloudy morning in Nangur village in Bastar district, Chattisgarh. It is a settlement of a little over 400 families, considered fairly large in these parts. We make a bumpy journey down a narrow, unpaved road intermittently shaded by sargi (sal)...