New Delhi, Feb. 5 -- Going by the national accounts, if there is one sector that seems to have done well in recent years, it is agriculture. As the Economic Survey also notes, the sector as a whole has grown 4.4% annually in the last five years and 3.9% in the last 10 years.

These are impressive numbers for a sector that employs the highest number of workers in India's economy. But also because they outshine the sector's own past performance. Yet, data from the field also suggests that the agrarian sector is in its longest and deepest phase of distress as far as income levels go.

Part of this contradictory assessment of agriculture stems from the way its data is collected and made available. While growth rates are generally presented in...