Sugarcane Belt

The voters of eight Lok Sabha constituencies in western Uttar Pradesh, falling in the Jat and sugarcane belt, are set to exercise their constitutional right as polling for the first phase of the seven-phase parliamentary election begins tomorrow..

About 55 kilometres from Delhi is a town that is India's most polluted area right now. Data from the Central Pollution Control Board this morning showed the AQI or Air Quality Index at Baghpat, a town in western Uttar Pradesh's sugarcane belt, at a critically polluted 500 - the maximum possible reading from government monitors.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday targeted the opposition for yesterday's no-confidence motion in parliament, including a dig at Rahul Gandhi's headline-grabbing hug. At a rally in Uttar Pradesh's Shahjahanpur, PM Modi repeated his allegation that opposition leaders were "blinded by lust for power".

As Raj Kumar navigates his bullock cart, loaded with sugarcane, into a private sugar mill in Lakhimpur Kheri, delayed payments for his crop are uppermost on his mind. The district is just one in the sugar belt of Uttar Pradesh, where, more than demonetization, this is one subject that is expected to affect the outcome in 105 seats.

Past the sugarcane fields and mustard plantations along the National Highway 58, around 10 km before the entry point to Muzzaffarnagar town in western Uttar Pradesh, stands the first major security barricade. The paramilitary force personnel with automatic weapons and in their olive green fatigues seemed a bit more than the usual security bandobast...

Mandya is the sugarcane belt of Karnataka, at least in good years. But in 2015, the district saw the highest number of farmer suicides in the state.

Usually, the fertile sugarcane belt of Mandya is a feast for the eyes with green sugarcane and brilliant green paddy. But water scarcity this year means that it was not worth planting much of the January paddy - and the farmers who went ahead with sugarcane are watching their crops dry in the field.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will be visiting Karnataka today for a rally as part of his farmer outreach programme. The PM is scheduled to speak later this afternoon at Belagavi in the north of the state.

With 107 farmer suicide deaths reported in Karnataka this year, the state government has come under fire from the opposition. Most of the deaths have been reported from the fertile sugarcane belts of South Karnataka due to low prices of their crop.

13 farmers have committed suicide in the last 20 days in the sugarcane belt of Mandya in Karnataka. Sugarcane prices have fallen and sugar factories have not been always been paying farmers for the crop they have taken.

India's sugar belts are on the boil as anger and desperation spills out on the street as farmers agitate for a higher price for their cane.

The village of Fugana, like so many in the sugarcane belt of Western Uttar Pradesh, has been prosperous, but for the most part, it was a quiet one, with few flashpoints between the Hindu Jats who form the majority and a few hundred Muslim families, who work their fields. The white-hot signs of how that changed this weekend are everywhere today - in...

In sugarcane belt of Marathwada, there's hardly any cane this time around. The reason: two years of drought.

Pune's agricultural university is already appealing to farmers not to grow sugarcane this year.

The voters of eight Lok Sabha constituencies in western Uttar Pradesh, falling in the Jat and sugarcane belt, are set to exercise their constitutional right as polling for the first phase of the seven-phase parliamentary election begins tomorrow..

About 55 kilometres from Delhi is a town that is India's most polluted area right now. Data from the Central Pollution Control Board this morning showed the AQI or Air Quality Index at Baghpat, a town in western Uttar Pradesh's sugarcane belt, at a critically polluted 500 - the maximum possible reading from government monitors.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday targeted the opposition for yesterday's no-confidence motion in parliament, including a dig at Rahul Gandhi's headline-grabbing hug. At a rally in Uttar Pradesh's Shahjahanpur, PM Modi repeated his allegation that opposition leaders were "blinded by lust for power".

As Raj Kumar navigates his bullock cart, loaded with sugarcane, into a private sugar mill in Lakhimpur Kheri, delayed payments for his crop are uppermost on his mind. The district is just one in the sugar belt of Uttar Pradesh, where, more than demonetization, this is one subject that is expected to affect the outcome in 105 seats.

Past the sugarcane fields and mustard plantations along the National Highway 58, around 10 km before the entry point to Muzzaffarnagar town in western Uttar Pradesh, stands the first major security barricade. The paramilitary force personnel with automatic weapons and in their olive green fatigues seemed a bit more than the usual security bandobast...

Mandya is the sugarcane belt of Karnataka, at least in good years. But in 2015, the district saw the highest number of farmer suicides in the state.

Usually, the fertile sugarcane belt of Mandya is a feast for the eyes with green sugarcane and brilliant green paddy. But water scarcity this year means that it was not worth planting much of the January paddy - and the farmers who went ahead with sugarcane are watching their crops dry in the field.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will be visiting Karnataka today for a rally as part of his farmer outreach programme. The PM is scheduled to speak later this afternoon at Belagavi in the north of the state.

With 107 farmer suicide deaths reported in Karnataka this year, the state government has come under fire from the opposition. Most of the deaths have been reported from the fertile sugarcane belts of South Karnataka due to low prices of their crop.

13 farmers have committed suicide in the last 20 days in the sugarcane belt of Mandya in Karnataka. Sugarcane prices have fallen and sugar factories have not been always been paying farmers for the crop they have taken.

India's sugar belts are on the boil as anger and desperation spills out on the street as farmers agitate for a higher price for their cane.

The village of Fugana, like so many in the sugarcane belt of Western Uttar Pradesh, has been prosperous, but for the most part, it was a quiet one, with few flashpoints between the Hindu Jats who form the majority and a few hundred Muslim families, who work their fields. The white-hot signs of how that changed this weekend are everywhere today - in...

In sugarcane belt of Marathwada, there's hardly any cane this time around. The reason: two years of drought.

Pune's agricultural university is already appealing to farmers not to grow sugarcane this year.