Rainfed Agriculture

The Department of Water Resources, under the Ministry of Jal Shakti, has constituted a drafting committee on 5 November 2019 to revise the existing National Water Policy (NWP). Dr. Mihir Shah, a renowned water expert and a former member of the Planning Commission is chairing the committee. The committee has 10 principal members and it is expected that the committee produces a report within six months of its formation.

Railway stations to be classified based on wastewater generation

While Covid-19 has left many countries including India in the line of fire, the situation in India is now getting particularly alarming with the number of people infected by Covid-19 rising at a rapid pace. While cases continue to rise in some of the major Indian cities, the situation in Northeast appears to be relatively better as compared to other states although cases appear to be rising. 

Suddenly thrown out of work by a nationwide lockdown, the migrants who built our cities and our economies were forced to take the torturous walk away from the cities to their homes in rural India. As per the findings of a recent survey by the Impact and Policy Research Institute (IMPRI), New Delhi a new urban agenda focusing on dynamic urban planning processes and empowering the city governments is looked-for. The study points to the need for plugging the gaps instead of offering a hodgepodge of half-measures.

Nearly 260 million Indian could be pushed to poverty due to Covid-19: Researchers

With an attempt to contain the spread of deadly Covid-19, Indian government had announced a complete nation-wide lockdown from March 25 onwards. For the first time, the provisions of the National Disaster Management Act, 2005, were invoked since the law came into being after the 2004 tsunami. The National Executive Committee of the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) issued guidelines for these 21 days – the first phase of the lockdown. In the third phase, the lockdown had been extended till May 17.

The study, ‘Covid-19 induced lockdown - How is hinterland coping’, based on a large survey undertaken by a consortium of civil society organisations undertook a rapid assessment of the impact of series of lockdowns on rural poor households. Of the many coping mechanisms, the most prominent was that over 50 percent of households in rural India have reduced the number of meals, while about 68 percent have reduced the number of food items in the meal ever since the lockdown was imposed.

The global crisis due to Covid-19 has hit India after coursing through western Europe. India’s response to curtail the spread of the disease was quite decisive. It announced a Janata curfew on March 22, followed by a complete national lockdown from the midnight of March 24. This, however, exposed the fault lines in our system: thousands of migrant workers got stuck at various places, especially in metro cities, as they could not get enough time to plan their return. Providing them basic support like ration and shelter became a herculean task for the establishment. 

The exodus of migrant workers from urban areas back to their villages in the wake of country wide lockdown has brought rural poverty into sharp focus. Reconstruction of rural economy therefore needs policy and planning attention. Community economy is a branch of rural economy and among other ways of reconstructing the rural economy, promotion and strengthening of community economies of the poor is important.

Covid-19 will have major implications in rural areas where the Foundation for Ecological Security (FES), a non-profit organisation has been working towards conservation of natural resources through collective action of local communities. Experience indicates that the complete lockdown to contain the spread of the disease has resulted in loss of rural incomes. The risk of spread of the virus too has increased with migrants returning to villages.