Stay updated with breaking news from ப் சாய்நாத். Get real-time updates on events, politics, business, and more. Visit us for reliable news and exclusive interviews.
updated: Mar 16 2021, 10:15 ist Farmers have been demanding APMC reforms for 30 years, but the Modi government’s farm laws – central laws on a state subject, rammed through without consultations with either the states or even Parliament are not reforms to help farmers but at enabling a corporate takeover of the agrarian economy, veteran journalist and Magsaysay awardee P Sainath tells DH’s Anitha Pailoor. Farmers have been in the news for a few months now. They were so for a while even in 2016, when the government said it would help double farmers’ income by 2022… The first thing I recall is that they declared that they would double farmers’ incomes by 2022 without once clarifying whether they meant a doubling of nominal income or real income. If it’s nominal income, everybody’s incomes would double by 2022. If it’s real income, that is a very huge task. And it’s very clear that as of now if there is any difference, the difference in real inco ....
‘Make farmers’ struggle into a people’s movement’ Updated: Updated: Need to safeguard agriculture, food security: Sainath Share Article Need to safeguard agriculture, food security: Sainath Terming the Centre’s three farm laws as “unconstitutional”, veteran journalist and Ramon Magsaysay Award recipient Palagummi Sainath said the need of the hour is to buttress the ongoing resilient farmers’ struggle into a people’s movement to safeguard agriculture and the national food security. Local committees be formed at the district and mandal level across the country by involving all sections of society to espouse the cause of farmers under the banner ‘Kisan Bachao – Desh Bachao’ (Save Farmers – Save the Country), he said, adding that the products of the corporate companies hurting farmers’ interests should be boycotted. ....
Official Panel Sees âWestern Biasâ in Indiaâs Low Press Freedom Rank But Wants Defamation Decriminalised âIndex Monitoring Cellâ member P. Sainath distances himself from âdraftâ report, submits separate note. Despite the growing number of cases against journalists, the draft official report on improving India s press freedom ranking claims, The work culture in the Government of India involves transparency as the norm . Image: Bill Kerr/Flickr, CC BY-SA 2.0 Rights14/Mar/2021 Mumbai: A committee set up by the Narendra Modi government last year to suggest ways of India improving its ranking in the World Press Freedom Index has concluded that the media is doing well and that Indiaâs poor score â which it says is ânot in line with the ground situationâ â is the product of âwestern biasâ. ....
Among committee’s key recommendations is to decriminalise defamation Pointing out that the right to dissent should be the central focus of press freedom, independent journalist P. Sainath struck a dissenting note in the report submitted by the Index Monitoring Cell (IMC), set up by the Information and Broadcasting Ministry with stakeholders, to improve India’s ranking in the World Press Freedom Index and to evolve an objective yardstick to gauge media freedom. “The right to dissent is very central.You know there are people filing FIRs and taking legal action against journalists (and other citizens) under the Epidemic Act, Disaster Act, sedition laws. We are shutting down the Internet for six months or more for whole regions,” Mr. Sainath made this observation, in his 12-page dissent note, along with three indices with a complete list of journalists, activists and stand-up comedians who have been arrested and intimidated by the State in the last one year. ....
Drought Is Not Simply a Natural Calamity, It Is Also Driven by Commercial Greed In his foreword to Kavitha Iyer s book Landscapes of Loss , P. Sainath writes about the commodification of water and the thriving thirst economy in the Marathwada region. Representative image of a handpump. Photo: nevil zaveri/Flickr (CC BY 2.0) As India witnesses its largest-ever farmers’ agitation, Landscapes of Loss: The Story of an Indian Drought, a new book by Kavitha Iyer, takes a close look at several of the deeper issues that have been afflicting the country’s farming community for decades now and brought it to this desperate pass. ....