Sustainability

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Featured Articles
July 2, 2024
From scarcity to sharing: How farmers are managing groundwater in Rayalaseema
Community governance for groundwater management
Jasmine on the fields as part of the groundwater collectivisation agreement at Kummara Vandla Palli village, Sri Satya Sai District. (Images: WASSAN/Swaran)
June 30, 2024
How Burhanpur became India's first Har Ghar Jal District
SHGs empower women, ensure sustainability: A model for water tax collection in Burhanpur
Rural water security (Image: Shawn, Save the Children USA; CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)
January 7, 2024
Evolution of state's role in rural drinking water governance in India
Need to nudge state governments to evolve a detailed roadmap (planning, implementation and operations related strategies)—immediate, medium and long-term—for ensuring drinking water security.
Demand-responsive approach became the mainstay of the project with the initiation of sectoral reforms (Image: India Water Portal Flickr)
December 28, 2023
Creating scalable, sustainable agriculture programs
The report presents six case studies on how sustainable agriculture programmes scaled up in the past in India
A farmer uses a hosepipe to irrigate crops at her farm in the Nilgiris mountains, Tamil Nadu (Image: IWMI Flickr Photos; CC BY-NC-ND 2.0 DEED)
December 19, 2023
Employment potential of India's Jal Jeevan Mission
This IIM Bangalore study highlights the spillover effects of public investments in rural water supply systems in the form of employment generation.
The employment structure under Jal Jeevan Mission encompasses both direct and indirect employment during construction and O&M phases. (Image: Wallpaperflare)
December 12, 2023
Insights from Atal Bhujal Yojana in Rajasthan
Learnings from India's Participatory Groundwater Management Programme
Launched in 2019, Atal Bhujal Yojana aims to mainstream community participation and inter-ministerial convergence in groundwater management. (Image: Picryl)
Angry, swirling waters
When the twisted model of Uttarakhand’s development goes wrong, a river lashes out killing many. A new book tries to shed light on what went wrong to cause the great Kedarnath disaster.
Amita Bhaduri
Posted on 07 Nov, 2016 09:55 PM

“The gravity of the Kedarnath disaster in June 2013, which killed thousands of people, shocked the public almost to the point of numbness”... begins the forward by Bill Aitken in Hridayesh Joshi’s account of the disaster Rage of the river: The untold story of the Kedarnath disaster. It’s a sentence which will whirl in your mind while you read Joshi’s book.
Gori floods (Source: Chicu Lokgariwar, India Water Portal)
Should wildlife suffer in the name of water?
Ken-Betwa river-linking project, if realised, will wipe out a portion of the Panna Tiger Reserve with its flora and fauna. The government, however, is adamant about its plan.
Amita Bhaduri
Posted on 06 Nov, 2016 09:47 PM

Set in India-ka-dil, Madhya Pradesh, is the unending expanse of Panna.
Ken river flows through Panna tiger reserve. (Source: K Gagan, Wikimedia Commons)
Maha battle over water
The Mahanadi’s water is important for both the farmers and industries of Odisha and Chhattisgarh. Instead of squabbling over it, the states need to come up with a plan to use the water judiciously.
Makarand Purohit
Posted on 03 Nov, 2016 12:07 PM

It’s a battle that dates back to 1957. Two states of India--Madhya Pradesh (MP) and Odisha--have fought fiercely over the water of the Mahanadi they share. When Chhattisgarh was carved out of MP in 2000, it inherited both the Mahanadi and the conflict with Odisha over its water.
Mahanadi river
Saving inland fisherfolk
Inland fishermen are fast disappearing. With inshore fishing picking up pace in India, this community needs to be saved.
Makarand Purohit
Posted on 03 Nov, 2016 06:07 AM

In his late 30s, Nilesh Heda is a renowned expert on issues related to fishing communities and wetland ecology. While doing his PhD on fish diversity, he worked with the fishing communities in Vidarbha in Maharashtra.
Dr Nilesh Heda
Keeping beach body in shape
Changing coastlines lead to erosion and threaten livelihoods of people dependent on it for survival. Artificial embankments provide temporary relief, but add to the problem in the long run.
Seetha Gopalakrishnan
Posted on 21 Oct, 2016 08:36 PM

Life without sandy beaches is hard to imagine for artisanal fishermen. Beaches serve as boat-landing sites, net-repair yards, as spots to sort and dry fish, all at once. Increased erosion and the resultant loss of beaches essentially means loss of traditional livelihoods, all across the country’s densely-populated coast.
Seawall lines Pondicherry's Promenade beach. (Image courtesy: Lalit Verma for India’s disappearing beaches - A wake up call)
Who cares for a canal?
Buckingham canal in Chennai plays a crucial role in flood mitigation. It is rapidly deteriorating and needs immediate attention to avoid a repeat of last year's flood.
Seetha Gopalakrishnan
Posted on 14 Oct, 2016 06:49 AM

Long-time Kottur resident Narayanan’s earliest memories of the Buckingham canal are those of the famed salt and timber-laden wooden catamarans of the 1950s and the 60s. A namesake of the Duke of Buckingham and Chandos, the erstwhile governor of Madras, the canal was initially constructed as a brackish water-navigation channel in the early 1800s, connecting the north of Madras with Ennore.
Elevated MRTS rail line right on the canal in Adyar (Image: Seetha Gopalakrishnan, IWP)
Can we build castles without sand?
Sand mining is posing a huge threat to the life of the rivers in the country. Increasing water scarcity demands a permanent solution to this and alternatives to sand have come up as an option.
Manu Moudgil
Posted on 14 Oct, 2016 05:45 AM

Sand is today the most consumed raw material in the world after water. From building infrastructure to making glass, silicon chips, solar panels and even detergents and toothpastes, sand is an omnipresent element of our living.
Illegal mining affects the natural course of the river, its flood-regulation capacity and the groundwater levels.
Farmers think tanks, fight to save water
While the villagers fight to save Puducherry’s cascading tank systems, corrupt authorities come in the way of their efforts.
Seetha Gopalakrishnan
Posted on 29 Sep, 2016 05:57 PM

The union territory (UT) Of Puducherry is, for the most part, enveloped on three sides by the state of Tamil Nadu with the Bay of Bengal framing its eastern face. A total of 84 irrigation tanks--part of the Gingee and Pennaiyar river systems--dot the territory’s landscape. 
Villagers offer their prayers to the guardian of the Bahour tank, Ayyanar (Image: Seetha Gopalakrishnan, IWP)
Cauvery crisis: Karnataka to move SC for more time
Policy matters this week
Sabita Kaushal
Posted on 25 Sep, 2016 09:40 PM

Karnataka to seek more time to release Cauvery water
Cauvery river, Karnataka. (Source: Ashwin Kumar via Wikimedia Commons)
Who gives a sh*t?
Skin irritations, respiratory distresses and sometimes even death, it is a life of suffering for the cleaners of human filth.
Seetha Gopalakrishnan
Posted on 20 Sep, 2016 05:47 PM

“My mother used to head out with a basket full of ash every day. She would visit dry latrines in the area one by one, sprinkle the ash on the night soil, scoop it up and carry the excreta-filled basket on her head to dump the contents into a small tanker. This was almost 40 years back in our 'Singara (beautiful) Chennai',” recounts Ravanaiah.
Despite the ban, manual scavenging continues. (Image courtesy: The Hindu)
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