Voluntary Citizen or Civil Society Sector

Every year, thousands of villages in Maharashtra get affected by droughts. Experts say that the reasons for recurrent droughts include a lack of policy framework, technical knowledge and community participation as well as poor implementation of government programmes.

India has long undervalued one of its most precious resources—water. Today the country’s chronic mismanagement of water has led to drought in nearly 2,00,000 villages. According to the World Bank data, Indian farmers use almost 70 percent of the total groundwater that is drawn in the country each year. Shockingly, India uses more groundwater annually than China and the United States combined.

One of the major causes of deterioration of water quality is the increase in overall salinity. Total hardness and the presence of materials like fluoride, nitrate, iron, arsenic, and toxic metal ions determine salinity levels in groundwater. With the demand for groundwater growing rapidly, its exploitation is also accelerating which causes depletion.

As part of Bonjour India 2017-2018, the four-months-long, ongoing Indo-French journey celebrating the Indo-French partnership, water-related issues are being highlighted through research, art and debates in cities like Jaipur, Bengaluru, New Delhi, Pondicherry and Kolkata.

This year’s budget was expected to be extensively farmer- and rural-sector oriented. And that is exactly what it turned out to be. The distress in the agrarian sector has intensified and its political implications were rife this year considering the Lok Sabha elections are scheduled next year.

Kashmir was once known for its pristine mountains, lakes, beautiful landscape and clean environment. In the last few decades, however, things have changed. An increasing amount of untreated garbage produced by humans is becoming a critical problem affecting not only the health of the residents of Kashmir but its environment, too.

Understanding water in all its forms in every part of the water cycle is vital to ensuring its sustainable and equitable management. Whether there is a scarcity of water or an excess of it, knowing precisely the quantum of water, whether underground in aquifers, embedded in the soil as soil moisture or in numerous lakes, reservoirs and rivers is vital.

Pitidri is a nondescript village that dots the rainshadow area of Purulia district in West Bengal. Droughts are common here even when the area is endowed with above average rainfall of over 1300 mm a year. Until some time ago, Urmila Mahato, a 42-year-old farmer from Pitidri had been struggling to ensure her family’s food security.

Alternative Futures: India Unshackled is a book that brings together scenarios of an India that is politically and socially egalitarian, radically democratic, economically sustainable and equitable, and socio-culturally diverse and harmonious.

Ambikapur has become a role model for all the urban local bodies (ULBs) in Chhattisgarh for its successful solid liquid resource management (SLRM). Thanks to Ritu Sen, former collector of Ambikapur and her team for taking the initiative to clean the city and for bringing the women's self-help groups (SHGs) together for this noble cause.