The government's recent traditional knowledge digital library will send data to patent offices abroad, so that indigenous knowledge that India abundantly has is not patented overseas. Following India's example, other nations too are showing interest in similarly protecting their interests. Ramesh Menon reports.

While single-minded pursuit of exports has helped China touch record growth figures, millions have been left behind, besides incurring huge environmental costs. And without even the limited dose of welfare that China offers its poor farmers, India must wary of copying China's SEZ-approach, writes Bhaskar Goswami.

At a two-day international seminar on "Saving Doha and delivering on development" that concluded at New Delhi on 13 March, India's Commerce Minister Kamal Nath provided ample evidence of India's willingness to go along with the rich and industrialised countries. The writing is on the wall, says Devinder Sharma.

A range of criticisms raised at a recent seminar in Mumbai are a sufficient indication of the extent to which SEZs are being pushed as a government policy without any public consultation on their pros and cons. The seminar, on SEZs and their implications for urban planning, was held at the Rachana Sansad School of Architecture. Darryl D'Monte reports.

The country's latest Geographical Indication certificate offers some new hope - of putting the sheen and colour back in a vital piece of Indian heritage, and livelihoods linked to it. Puja Awasthi reports.

Three and half decades after a scientist demonstrated the idea, chappals made with areca leaf sheaths have hit the market from Kerala. Shrikrishna D writes about the early success and challenges.

In search of new funds to keep the growth story alive, the Centre opens the doors to foreign investment a little further.

Whether foreign direct invesmtent in retail in India is good or bad should be judged by a reasoned debate based on facts, not hyperbole and exaggeration. Jacob John reports.

It is far from clear if capital exports out of India are good for India. What is apparent, from their enthusiasm, is that Indian companies believe it is good for them. Kannan Kasturi reports.

India's current account deficit reached alarming levels in the year 2012-13. Kannan Kasturi provides a historical context and lucid explanation of the phenomenon and rues the government's shocking lack of action.

The drying up of the dollar and the resultant plummet of the rupee reflects on the government's flawed economic strategy. Shyam Sekhar draws upon the famous business fable Who Moved My Cheese? to show the kind of behaviour and actions that could resolve the crisis now.

The Indian government has stopped short of imposing effective controls on gold imports despite the soaring current account deficit and its concomitant ills. Kannan Kasturi examines recent trends in gold demand to see if the government's rationale behind the soft policy holds good.

A recent editorial in The New York Times rightly recognises the flaws of a growth model driven by lower trade barriers. But Devinder Sharma wonders if the American daily will take a stand and extend its arguments to champion the cause of all nations, including India.

The immense untapped potential of hydropower generation in Bhutan has led to several major projects in the offing, with varying degrees of Indian involvement. However, Shripad Dharmadhikary finds a steady rise in voices questioning their impact on the Himalayan environment.

Most measures of inflation over the last couple of months point to an encouraging downward movement in price indices; Shambhu Ghatak deconstructs these measures and quotes observations of the RBI to show why it may still be premature to take low inflation for granted.

The government’s thrust on ‘ease of doing business’ and ‘Make in India’ rests significantly on the premise of attracting foreign capital into manufacturing. Kannan Kasturi tracks data on FDI inflows to see whether it indicates true potential to boost the sector and job creation.

The ruling by the World Trade Organisation (WTO)’s dispute settlement body (DSB) in a complaint filed by USA against elements of India’s solar mission is again in the news. Shalini Bhutani helps to piece together the sequence of events and points out how the global trade architecture keeps domestic laws and policies under intense scrutiny.

P Sainath joins migrants fleeing the desperate conditions in Mahbubnagar, seeking a meagre living in faraway places
Part II : The wrong route out?

June 2003, Mahbubnagar bus depot, Telangana, AP - The mercury is coming up on 46°, maybe 47°C as the passengers arrive. It's the bus to Mumbai and its 58 seats will be more than full. Perhaps at the starting point itself.

It's a temperature at which you hate everybody and arguments driven by colourful prose ring out in the bus depot (and on the buses). The travellers, like lakhs of others in this poorest of Andhra Pradesh's districts, are voting with their feet. Most of them are tiny farmers and landless workers. The biggest group consists of Lambada adivasis. There are many poor dalits too. All getting out of a situation they find intolerable. In some estimates, close to a third of the district's populace could be working outside it just now.

P Sainath reports on the serious problem of rural hunger in Andhra Pradesh, and the politics of free lunches.
Part II : Hi-tech, low nutrition

The worse things have become in Anantapur district, the more fancy cars have shown up in town. Drought, says P Sainath, is the organised plunder of the poor.

By having elections at a time when people are forced to migrate in search of work, we are simply excluding an ever-growing number of citizens from the vote, says P Sainath.

The media have decided that 70 per cent of the population does not make news. The electorate has decided otherwise. P Sainath contrasts expectations before the elections with actual outcomes, and finds plenty that should have been always evident.

P Sainath on the fault lines in Andhra that led to the ouster of the Chandrababu Naidu led Telugu Desam Party.

P Sainath.

Almost every sector failed the Andhra Pradesh farmer - the Government, the political class, intellectuals, planners, human rights groups, a once-activist judiciary and the media, says P Sainath.

The seed, pesticide and fertilizer dealers are the new moneylenders of the AP countryside. The power this group wields is a vital factor in the ongoing crisis and continuing suicides of farmers. P Sainath continues his series.

P Sainath.

Seeds, fertilizer and pesticide dealers are at the centre of a growing controversy in Andhra Pradesh. They are the new moneylenders to a peasantry strapped for credit. P Sainath concludes his series on farmer suicides in AP.

P Sainath.

Long before the drought bit deep, Anantapur was already in trouble. The close links between workers, farming and industry were broken by the new policies of the 1990s. P Sainath continues his series on farmer suicides in Andhra.

Suicides amongst their own numbers are not the only way women farmers are hit by the ongoing crisis. Suicides by their husbands leave many in a predatory world. P Sainath continues his series on farmer suicides in Andhra.

As farming floundered, many families came to the towns. The men sought work as auto drivers or daily wage labour. Often without success. In this struggle against poverty, the stress on their wives was enormous. P Sainath continues his series on farmer suicides in Andhra.

For many in Andhra Pradesh's agrarian crisis, even death is not the end of the trouble. Instead, it is the beginning of a new burden for the families of the survivors. P Sainath continues his series on farmer suicides in Andhra.

The ongoing agrarian crisis has had a telling impact, causing the lapse of insurance policies of farmers. P Sainath reports.

Calls for the renewal of hundreds of thousands of lapsed insurance policies have begun, reports P Sainath.

P Sainath finds that the declining fortune and health of the religious establishment in Kerala's Wayanad region mirrors what is happening to the parishioners themselves.

Many plantations have shut down, throwing thousands out of work. The once-numerous Tamil migrant labourers are far fewer today, and out-migration of local labour is the new trend. P Sainath finds the off-screen agrarian crisis is very dramatic too, and has emptied the audiences for big screens in the region.

It's no longer just landless labourers on the bus to Kutta. Many masons and carpenters are also crossing the border into Karnataka in search of work, spurred on by the collapse of employment in Wayanad. P Sainath continues his series on the agrarian crisis in Wayanad.

Church income has fallen sharply as the laity have gone into debt in Wayanad. But the larger reality is also more complex. While the church does reflect the pain of its farmer base, it is also, in some cases, a source of at least a few of the dues that worry them, notes P Sainath.

Prior to 1995, KSRTC did not have a single bus on this route, but nowadays there are 24 trips between Manathavady in Wayanad and Kutta in Kodagu, Karnataka. By the second stop on the journey, there is not a seat vacant. P Sainath continues his series on the agrarian crisis in Wayanad.

Toddy is legal in Kerala, while arrack is banned. Also, while a litre of toddy costs Rs. 30, a sachet of arrack goes for Rs. 11. As the farm crisis sees thousands of migrants crossing over into Karnataka, arrack shops right on the border are booming. P Sainath continues his series on the agrarian crisis in Wayanad.

Two processes have hit Wayanad. One is the policy-driven commercialisation of education. And the second is the collapse of Wayanad's economy. For the first time in decades in this education-proud state thousands of students are dropping out of college and school. P Sainath continues his series on the agrarian crisis in Wayanad.

This is coffee territory, yet you cannot get the local brew in any restaurant here. Drop in at the Coffee Board in Kalpetta to enquire why this is so - and they offer you a cup of tea. P Sainath continues his series on the agrarian crisis in Kerala's Wayanad region.

The elite wants a society geared to deal with rare disasters but shows no urgency at all when it comes to the destruction of the livelihoods of millions by policy and human agency. P Sainath turns our consciences towards Mumbai's demolitions of tens of thousands of the homes of slum-dwellers.

Imports of pepper from Sri Lanka, including large quantities that are simply routed through that country but not actually produced there, have devastated farmers in Wayanad, home of the world's best pepper. P Sainath continues his series on the agrarian crisis in this region.

"It is time for my daughter to get married but where's the money? We ran a teashop for a long time. That folded as people had no more to spend." P Sainath finds that as the agrarian crisis has deepened in Wayanad, many people are now simply unable to afford weddings.

The United Progressive Alliance Government has no sense of how serious things are in the countryside. It seems to have forgotten what and who brought it to power. P Sainath has his own report card on the government's performance, and it's very different from the one with the Prime Minister.

The scenes from Gurgaon gave us more than just a picture of one labour protest, police brutality or corporate tyranny. It presented us a microcosm of the new and old Indias. Different rules and realities for different classes of society, says P Sainath.

With the PM not entirely rejecting British claims to good governance, this Independence Day week is a proper time to review the legacy of the Raj. One finds that colonial governance was certainly good for the British, while tens of millions of Indians died of wilful and callous neglect, writes P Sainath.

About the time 50 Dalit houses were set ablaze in Gohana, the country marked 50 years of a law giving effect to the Constitution's abolition of untouchability. As if to rub it in, 25 more Dalit homes were torched the same week in Akola, Maharashtra, writes P Sainath.