Down to Earth Nirasiya Bai’s three sons are used to their mother fainting every other week. Small pieces of shakkar (brown sugar) are now kept handy and placed swiftly under her tongue every time she is on the verge of collapsing. In March alone, three such incidents have occurred. The 52-year-old resident of Shivtarai village in Chattisgarh’s Bilaspur district is a diabetes patient. Nearly every other family in the village houses...

The year 2022 was supposed to mark the recovery of the Indian economy from the Covid-19 pandemic and lockdowns of the preceding two years. However, the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February pushed up prices of food, fuel and fertilizer worldwide. In India consumer price inflation, which had declined to under 5 percent in the September-November period of 2021, has steadily increased, staying above 6 percent throughout 2022.    What happened to rural incomes in 2022? An...

Economic Times Unilever global chief executive Alan Jope said high inflation impacted demand from low income consumers in Indian villages even as growth remains stronger in cities. "The market growth in India remains stronger in urban areas than in rural areas and that reflects the high impact of high food inflation on low income consumers. We are seeing rural markets broadly flat in value terms with lower volumes," Jope said during its...

Wheat prices have stayed stubborny high in India, despite several steps by the government including an export ban and announcing open market prices. - Mint Official figures show that daily retail wheat flour (atta) prices as on 1 February were 22% higher year on year, while wholesale prices were 31% higher. Wheat prices have been inching up through 2022 after a heat wave cut production and pushed the government to ban exports...

-Hindustan Times The meeting came after Prime Minister Narendra Modi expressed concern over the Joshimath land subsidence issue and reviewed the situation with Uttarakhand chief minister Pushkar Singh Dhami The Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) has held a high-level review meeting on the land subsidence activities in Uttarakhand’s Joshimath and a team of central agencies and experts are assisting the state government to prepare short, medium and long-term remedial measures to deal with...