Governance

The National Centre for Advocacy Studies (NCAS) is a social change resource centre working with social action groups, public interest professionals, and people from all over India and the Global South.

Advocacy Internship is a programme that grooms young and dedicated professionals who are committed to social activism. It seeks to cater to the needs of current campaigns for social justice. The internship programme undertakes to enrich the participants with a political perspective, knowledge base and skills required for effective public advocacy.

Apeejay Surrendra Group in association with i-Volunteer and International Business Leaders Forum, UK (IBLF) has announced the commencement of the Apeejay India Volunteer Awards 2011 (AIVA), an annual national recognition focused on rewarding work of volunteers and volunteer engaging corporate and NGOs. AIVA aims to identify champions in volunteering in India, recognize volunteers and organizations engaged in volunteering, raise awareness around volunteering, celebrate and promote this much needed effort and drive volunteering as a mainstream interest in Indians.

  The Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy draws on the experiences of the Tamilnadu Women’s Collective (WC), a state-level federation of women’s groups from 1,500 villages, in the context where communities all around the world are struggling to find ways to cope with changes affecting food and water security because of the phenomenon of climate change.

The report argues that many a times, new food and water security policies at the national and international level tend to be narrow, look at each of these issues in isolation and  undermine food and water security strategies adopted by individuals and households from marginal groups. Adaptation strategies to address food security focus almost exclusively on increasing agricultural production, while ignoring health and cultural aspects of the food being produced, and the role of agriculture as a means for rural viability.

The Government of India’s 15-year old AIBP has come under much-deserved criticism for all-round non-performance. It was introduced to support states in "last mile" public irrigation projects, that is, projects which are nearly completed but whose full benefits can start flowing only after small, incremental investments are made. Yet, the AIBP has been used mostly for funding new projects.

These reforms have led to the establishment of Independent Regulatory Authorities (IRAs) in the water sector through the enactment of laws at the state level.

The River cleaning project is to the tune of US $ 1 billion (approximately Rs 4,600 crore) loan and credit that will form part of the Bank’s long-term support for cleaning the Ganga River. Two Biodiversity Conservation agreements are for a credit of US$15.6 million and US$8.14 million grant.

On this occasion, Sh Jairam Ramesh , Minister of State for Environment and Forest Minister said, “Two protected areas, one each in Uttarakhand and Gujarat, will put in place a complete new model of managing the protected areas while safeguarding the livelihoods of local communities. So far local community was looked as enemies of protected areas, but this has to be changed. We have to make local communities full partners in the protection and regeneration of these protected areas. These new models will be applied in other areas of the country.” Giving details of cleaning operations of last few years, the Minister said, “The objective of Ganga project is ‘by 2020 no municipal sewage and industrial effluent will be let into the river Ganga without treatment’. With the help from the World bank, we are taking a big step forward in achieving the Mission Clean Ganga”.

The Bagmati Embankment separating riverside on the left and countryside of the right near Ibrahimpur – Electric poles suggest the height of the embankment

One often hears about the civilizations buried under earth and attributes various reasons for such disappearance of life from a particular place. Excavations reveal the way of life the people might have had before they chose to leave their villages and towns and allowed the nature to take its own course. These accounts are available in books and we all believe the process told to us by historians and archaeologists. These are all conjectures that are revealed by scientific investigations but how many of us have seen, not read, how the civilizations get buried under the debris created by nature? There are places in Bihar where one can see the process of disappearance of civilization and the villages getting buried under the sediments brought by rivers.

The Times of India Social Impact Awards in partnership with J.P.Morgan is a platform wherein applications and nominations for Awards can be made by NGO’s, corporates and government organizations under five categories (Health, Education, Environment, Livelihood, and Empowerment & Advocacy).

Pravah is an organization based in New Delhi that works with young people to impact issues of social justice through youth citizenship action.

SMILE internship gives you an opportunity to explore your self as you experience life in a community, learn about the joys and struggles of the people, discover the treads that bind you and them, and understand your society better.

The Times of India Social Impact Awards in partnership with J.P.Morgan is a platform wherein applications and nominations for Awards can be made by NGO’s, corporates and government organizations under five categories (Health, Education, Environment, Livelihood, and Empowerment & Advocacy).