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Aakar Patel Page-9

The mid-day meal scheme, on which crores of children depended for their one good meal of the day, found its budget cut from Rs.13,400 crore in FY 2021 to Rs.11,500 crore in 2022. (LSTV/PTI file Photo)

Aakar Patel | Vital areas in kids’ health left ignored in Budget 2021

Poshan Abhiyan, the flagship programme meant to improve nutritional outcomes by 2022, was also damaged

16 Feb 2021 7:27 AM

While our government responded strongly to Rihanna and Greta Thunberg, with the external affairs ministry issuing a statement, it hasn’t said anything on this downgrade, which more people will read and take seriously than someone’s tweet. (Representational Photo: PTI)

Aakar Patel | Democracy Index: Why India’s rank now falling

India has fallen from a global ranking of 27 in 2015 to 53 in 2020

09 Feb 2021 4:04 AM

Aakar Patel | Modi’s eighth Budget looms, there’s still no ‘grand vision’

Unemployment has naturally followed the opposite trajectory, going from about 4% before Modi became PM to 6% and then to 9%

31 Jan 2021 12:37 AM

The India growth story is over and has been over for a few years now. You can make all the speeches that you want, you cannot argue against 39 straight months of slowing down. (Photo: Reuters)

Aakar Patel | Growth is just not picking up, but no end to triumphalism

We have entered the 13th consecutive quarter of economic slowdown in India

26 Jan 2021 12:05 AM

Aakar Patel | Nehru a model of modernity… Why his vision & legacy endures

The problem is that nobody in the world of Hindutva has any vision — good, bad or indifferent — when compared to Nehru

19 Jan 2021 6:49 AM

Aakar Patel | On Republic Day, time to reclaim our basic rights

None of the rights and liberties that the Constitution saw initially as being “fundamental” are present in the original form today

12 Jan 2021 10:50 AM

Government’s own data shows that Indians were earning and eating less in 2018 than they were in 2012 (Image:PTI)

Aakar Patel | Fragile Index shows India is headed into a scary future

India’s economic growth has slowed, declining to its lowest nominal level since 1978

05 Jan 2021 4:25 AM

The corporate groups are not in charge of how much of its agriculture and dairy India can export. It is the government that will have to force other nations to open their markets to our farmers (Image:PTI)

Aakar Patel | Farmers won’t put trust in PM, dharna unlikely to be over soon

Agriculture exports fell from $43 billion in 2013, before Mr Modi, to $38 billion last year

29 Dec 2020 4:35 AM

Aakar Patel | ‘Time bombs’ ticking in the Constitution are a worry

The Constitution is a terrific document, but it is also one that has suppressed the Hindu majoritarian sentiment

22 Dec 2020 7:05 AM

Aakar Patel | Modi govt’s real eco strategy: To let Big Biz grow & forget the rest

'Atma Nirbhar' privileges the industrialist over the consumer, but that is not the way that it is advertised

15 Dec 2020 8:54 AM

Farmers during their 'Delhi Chalo' protest march against the new farm laws, at Singhu border in New Delhi, Sunday, December 6 (PTI/Manvender Vashist)

Aakar Patel | Will Centre be forced to give in to the farmers?

Notice the similarities between the farmers’ movement and the protests across the country against the citizenship amendment laws

08 Dec 2020 8:39 AM

Union Home Minister Amit Shah with Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and Home Secretary Ajay Kumar Bhalla during the first National Implementation Committee meeting on 75 years of Independence, in New Delhi on November 25, (PTI /Shahbaz Khan)

Aakar Patel | Looking at the future in fear as economy goes into ‘de-growth’

India’s economy has contracted for six months since Prime Minister Narendra Modi called for the harshest lockdown in the world

01 Dec 2020 10:07 AM

An Indian nationals returns to India after being stranded due to the Covid-19 Coronavirus, at the India Pakistan-Wagah Border Post, some 35 km from Amritsar on November 23, 2020. (AFP)

Aakar Patel | From testing to travel, India’s Covid handling process is faulty

A report from Bloomberg this week said that questionable testing in India could be the reason why our Covid-19 numbers were down

24 Nov 2020 12:01 AM

Everything is looking bleak: Can Modi still bring change?

It is the personal attractiveness and credibility of the Prime Minister that has yet again taken the BJP through in Bihar

18 Nov 2020 1:34 AM

Amid new dawn in the US, India may now have to work differently

Most Indians may not know that in April India was earmarked as a “Country of Particular Concern” by the USCIRF

08 Nov 2020 4:21 AM

Election Commission of India (Photo: PTI)

Aakar Patel | Draw lessons from US, make voting in India better and safer

It must be asked if we cannot further reform the process and also learn from practices that other nations follow that might help us.

27 Oct 2020 6:40 PM

Bangladesh to overtake India? PR can’t fix all our problems

This week has come news that in the current financial year, Bangladesh will overtake India in terms of per capita income.

20 Oct 2020 1:35 AM

Aakar Patel | If you do not admit there’s a crisis, you can’t solve it

The problem is a major one, and it affects not just the Prime Minister but hundreds of millions of people across the country.

12 Oct 2020 10:55 PM

NGOs do a lot of the work government ought to be doing. (Representational image)

Aakar Patel | Several NGOs trying to uplift India might be forced to shut

Today India invites foreign investment in arms and ammunition but it restricts investment in health, education and people’s rights

29 Sep 2020 12:39 PM

Aakar Patel | Jaishankar’s prescriptions are simplistic, just excuses

The assumption Jaishankar makes about liberalisation automatically producing economic growth is false

15 Sep 2020 5:09 PM

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Bhopinder Singh