On agricultural prices, instead of running around like monkeys with our heads cut off, and letting the 30-second sound bites set the agenda, we need cool thinking.
First accept, though, that we are in a bit of a jam.
Indian agriculture is already increasingly demand-driven. This will accelerate in future. More than two decades ago, we argued that agricultural diversification in India was basically driven by higher growth and domestic demand. The major impact of faster income growth was on domestic demand, leading a process of demand diversification in a big way.
Large Indian cities are doing reasonably well. Ahmedabad, where I stay, has been voted one of the ten most attractive towns in India and once the adjoining panchayats became a part of the municipal corporation, it
Congressmen like Mani Shankar Aiyar, Jairam Ramesh and Arjun Sengupta have bowled a googly in saying that the grand old party will abolish hunger if elected. Impossible, you say?