Fate of Vizag Steel hangs in the balance with elections around the corner
The Bharatiya Janata Party’s return to power at the Centre in 2019 marked the beginning of their unrelenting stance to privatise the state-owned Visakhapatnam Steel Plant (Vizag Steel) in Andhra Pradesh. However, as the 2024 elections draw close, State leaders from the BJP and their alliance partners, the Telugu Desam
India’s employment crisis: Jobless growth, threat of automation, and impact of climate change on productivity
Unemployment and underemployment have always been important issues in post-Independence India. We have always been a primarily agrarian, labour-surplus economy with low capital stock that has manifested in low industrial productivity and a largely non-remunerative, monsoon-dependent agricultural sector. Key metrics for measuring the health of the job market are the
Editor’s Note | Vaishna Roy writes: Will India vote for what really matters?
As Prime Minister Modi stokes divisive fears, can the opposition offer a compelling alternative focused on lives, livelihoods and liberties? As I write this, a blazing summer is well underway across the country accompanied by the return of vitriol to the campaign trail. Prime Minister Modi’s brazenly communal reference to
Food inflation in India has been accelerating at more than 8 per cent year-on-year since November 2023
At the halfway mark of India’s elections, food remains a pinch point, for both consumers and producers. Inflation numbers bear the pain out: even as the overall retail inflation rate remained virtually unchanged in April, food inflation surged to a four-month high of 8.7 per cent, where rural consumers bore
Despite Election Commission’s campaigns urging every citizen to vote, millions of India’s migrant workers find it nearly impossible to exercise their democratic right.
“Among every 1,000 men in our villages, around 300 voters are working outside the State. It is not possible for all of them to return to cast their vote,” says Habib Biswas, 29, from Faridpur in Murshidabad district, West Bengal, who drives heavy vehicles for a living. He is, however,
India’s first opium processing factory in Uttar Pradesh’s Ghazipur stands as a testament to the region’s rich history
The opium factory in Ghazipur | Photo Credit: Anand Mishra India’s first opium processing factory, set up 200 years ago in Ghazipur district, Uttar Pradesh (UP) is now a thing of the past. There was a time, recalls Rudra Narayan Tiwari, a former journalist-turned-taxi-driver from Tiwaripur when the factory, ‘Govt
Digital Darkness: India leads the world in internet shutdowns
WATCH | Digital Darkness: India leads the world in internet shutdowns In light of India’s ranking in global internet shutdowns, watch this explainer about the reasons behind such shutdowns, internet blackouts in other nations, resultant fallouts, and so on. | Video Credit: Camera and editing by Samson Ronald K.; Presented
The other ‘Coal Scam’ – Frontline
More than a decade ago, when media and civil society were going gung-ho against the then UPA government for the “Coalgate” scandal, the furore was focussed on a report prepared by an independent institution, the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) of India, that revealed evidence implicating the Union government and
Lok Sabha Election Results Highlight India’s Jobs Crisis: Lessons from Demonetisation, COVID Mishandling, and Rising Inequality
India has voted. And as we emerge from that occluding corridor of time, there is space to see more clearly. A few grim realities continue to exist. India still has a jobs crisis, households are still struggling to make ends meet, and hate, as we have seen, does not make
India Heatwave 2024: Deaths, Crop Failures, and Economic Impact Highlight Climate Vulnerabilities
In his book The Heat Will Kill You First: Life and Death on a Scorched Planet Jeff Goodell writes; “We simply have not come to terms with it, especially in the way I am describing. It is not how anyone expects to die. In part, it’s because we live in