Governance

NGT bans granting general permissions for groundwater extraction to commercial entities

Monsoon 2020: Countrywide deficit of 10 percent in July; September may have heavy rains

The Amphan cyclone has disfigured the lives of people living in the Sundarbans. Houses have been torn apart, farms have been filled with brackish water making the land unsuitable for farming and betel leaves have been destroyed. People in the Sundarbans are in a life-threatening situation with makeshift shacks to live in and no means to earn a living.

National Water Mission’s (NWM) has launched a campaign ‘Catch the rain’ on a pan India basis to nudge the states and stakeholders to create appropriate rainwater harvesting structures (RWHS) suitable to the climatic conditions and sub-soil strata before the onset of monsoon.

Groundwater fulfills the drinking water requirements of nearly 85% and 50% of the rural and urban Indian population, respectively. 65% of the total irrigated area utilizes groundwater. It also caters to the water needs of the industrial sector in India. However, this intensive and unregulated extraction and utilization of groundwater has led to a sharp and severe decline in the groundwater levels. To arrest the decline in groundwater levels, Atal Bhujal Yojana or Atal Jal - perhaps India’s largest community-led groundwater management program to date - was launched in December 2019. 

Two weeks ago, the Kanakai River flowing through Kishanganj rendered dozens of families homeless. While the people in the region are staying under plastic sheds, the government has turned a blind eye to their plight.

Mohammadin is also one of them. He tells the India Water Portal,

“I have a family of 20 members, including women. We were living here for 10 years but from past three weeks, we have been living in a polythene shed.”

"All of a sudden, water entered the house at night. Goods and cattle were submerged. There is no place to eat or drink. We have been in trouble for three days, but no one has come to help us.” The elderly Gauri Singh complains, with mixed feelings of anger, pain and helplessness. 

Gauri Singh lives in Satjoda village of Satjoda panchayat of Panapur block in Chhapra district. He is about 80 years old, but he has not seen so much water in his village since he last remembers. 

Through no fault of their own, migrants were forced to leave the cities after the government imposed a Covid-19 induced national lockdown in late March. After losing their work, fearing they would run out of cash and food they trudged back along with their families to the villages in search of humanity, food, and a place to live.

Around 1 in 3 children – up to 800 million globally – have blood lead levels at or above 5 micrograms per decilitre (µg/dL), a level that the World Health Organization and the United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have stated requires global and regional interventions. India accounts for 275,561,163 of these children.

Lead poisoning is affecting children on a massive and previously unknown scale

A recent national study on farmer producer’s organisations (FPOs) supported by Tata Trusts investigates gaps looming in business transactions between FPOs and market players and recommends interventions to bridge these. The study titled ‘Identification of vibrant FPO clusters for effective market integration’ attempts to strengthen the linkages of FPOs with markets at scale.