Vikas Parashram Meshram

Vikas Parashram Meshram

Vikas Parashram Meshram is a senior journalist. He is also a social worker and activist working towards the rights of tribal and marginalized communities.
  • Joined: February 15, 2026
  • Articles: 18

The Economist Who Searches for the Human Behind the Numbers Jean Drèze

Discussion of inequality in India is often trapped in numbers and statistics. But the distinctive quality of Drèze's work is that he brings forward the human being hidden behind those numbers. The face of a grandmother sleeping hungry in a hut, of a tribal youth who goes to ask for work on a farm and returns empty-handed, of a Dalit woman who comes back with nothing because her Aadhaar scan would not work all these faces remain alive in Drèze's research.

Water Conservation Brings Stability to Life

Today, Dayabai is no longer confined to the limits of her home. She regularly reaches out to other women to strengthen the Saksham group and educates her community about the importance of water, land, forests, livestock, and native seeds. Her husband and other family members, who had earlier migrated for more than six months at a stretch, now farm their own land and live together as a family.

Rising Cost of Farming, Climate Change, and Debt Burden: The Fundamental Causes of Farmers’ Suicides

One of the main reasons pushing farmers toward suicide is that agriculture is no longer economically viable or capable of sustaining livelihoods. The reasons behind declining profitability include shrinking landholdings—from an average of 2.3 hectares in 1960–61 to 1.6 hectares in 2002–03—and rising expenses alongside income. Although farmers’ incomes have increased, their expenditures and debt burdens have grown even faster.