Rural Water

Featured Articles

October 25, 2019

Groundwater use has doubled in Pune. Comprehensive mapping of groundwater resources and better management and governance is the need of the hour.

Groundwater, an exploited resource (Image Source: India Water Portal)

October 24, 2019

How farm ponds in Madhya Pradesh are building agricultural resilience

An intern with Watershed Organisation Trust narrates his field experience from the villages of Madhya Pradesh, where farmers are using farm ponds to conserve water.

A farm pond constructed by Sheshrao Dhurve in Karaghat Kamti village of Madhya Pradesh

October 21, 2019

In conversation with K. J. Joy of SOPPECOM

In this interview, Joy talks about his work as an activist working in rural Maharashtra, and how he came to work on water conflicts in India.

KJ Joy speaks at a felicitation for the late Professor Ramaswamy Iyer.

October 16, 2019

Jal Jeevan Mission: States to bear half the cost, local bodies to decide water charges

Policy matters this week

Women filling water from a tap (Source: IWP Flickr photos)

October 1, 2019

From droughts to floods: India’s tryst with climate extremes

Deconstructing the traditional narrow engineering based policy discourses around floods and droughts and connecting them to social and cultural realities is the need of the hour in India.

Water talk Series at Mumbai (Image Source:Tata Insitute of Social Sciences)

September 30, 2019

The Water Future Conference in Bangalore: Towards a Sustainable Water Future

The recently concluded 4 day conference in Bangalore looked at the current state of global water resource challenges & future pathways to achieve the SDGs, while ensuring equity in access to all.

Charles Vorosmarty, Chair, COMPASS Initiative, Water Future at the opening plenary on advanced water system assessments to address water security challenges of the 21st century.

Mini piped water scheme helps overcome social exclusion

Promoting sustainable systems that facilitate provision of safe water and sanitation to communities in a tribal village. Amita Bhaduri posted 4 days 15 hours ago

In 2016, India ranked 131 among 188 countries in the Human Development Index (HDI). With a population of 1.3 billion, the need for services is high, a

Anganwadi Centres now provided with improved toilets and running water (Image: Water For People India)

Over 97 million Indians were currently being exposed to extreme floods: Report

News this week Swati Bansal posted 3 weeks 2 days ago

75 percent districts in India are hotspots of extreme climate events: Report

75 percent districts in India are hotspots of extreme climate events (Source: IWP Flickr photos))

Patterns of social exclusion in watershed development in India

How have watershed development projects fared in India? Have they helped in better distribution of benefits among the poor and marginalised? aartikelkar posted 1 month 2 weeks ago

How have watershed development projects fared in India? Have they helped in better distribution of benefits among the poor and marginalised? Why is it important to talk about watershed development at this juncture?

This book by Dr Eshwer Kale dwells on these questions and explores issues around social exclusion among resource-poor people in watershed development projects.

Watershed development: Towards equitable outcomes (Image Source: India Water Portal)

Women hold the key to dietary diversity

A study finds that women's control over income and better decisionmaking power can go a long way in improving dietary diversity and tackling malnutrition in rural India. aartikelkar posted 2 months 4 weeks ago

Evidence world over shows that small scale agricultural production does very little to deal with malnutrition and food insecurity among rural poor.

Empowering women to improve nutritional outcomes (Image Source: India Water Portal)

Data, data everywhere, but where?

Involving the community in a data framework with the right incentives will have the second-order benefit of the community becoming decision makers with respect to water use. Amita Bhaduri posted 2 months 4 weeks ago

A few of us did an exercise where we closed our eyes and thought of the first four words that came to our minds when we thought of water data in India. Here is what we came up with:

The seamless flow of data from one program to another can be enabled if a few principles are kept in mind (Image: José Manuel Suárez, Wikimedia Commons)

Data-driven ‘water and agriculture’ planning: The big picture

If data was better organized and available for download in more ‘user-friendly’ formats, its utilization would improve manifold. Amita Bhaduri posted 3 months ago

India is fortunate to have a rich tradition of public data collection and compilation.

The quality of our public data is highly variable, yet if analyses and interpretation are done keeping in mind some of the limitations, the datasets can be a precious resource at the meso and macro level. (Image: Pixabay)

Request for Proposal- Integrated Baseline Study of Raintree Foundation’s ‘Sustainable Integrated Rural Development’ Program in Rural Maharashtra

The baseline study is an integrated survey that will collect data & information tied with the performance indicators of the SIRD program, mapped out to assess the program’s long- term impact. Swati Bansal posted 3 months ago

Background

Groundwater recharge needs grassroots solutions: A study of two techniques in Kerala

Although groundwater is emerging as a critical issue and has managed to encourage new government schemes, a generic solution of rainwater recharge cannot be applied across different regions. Amita Bhaduri posted 3 months ago

In Kerala, around half the urban population and 80% of the rural population depend on open wells on their domestic water needs. But in the last decade, the majority of observatory wells recorded an average annual decline of half a meter.

Rainwater is captured from the rooftop of the community hall and diverted to the sump before it is pumped into the open well. (Image by Authors)

New groundwater guidelines prohibit industries and mining in over-exploited zones

Policy matters this week Swati Bansal posted 3 months 1 week ago

Revised guidelines for groundwater use notified

Centre issues revised guidelines for groundwater use (Source: IWP Flickr Photos)

Dhenkanal gears up for better waste management

Odisha reiterates commitment to urban sanitation by launching pioneering state-wide initiative on solid and liquid waste management. Amita Bhaduri posted 3 months 2 weeks ago

The UNICEF and the Scaling City Institutions for India (SCI-FI) initiative at the Centre for Policy Research (CPR) in collaboration with the Panchayati Raj and Drinking Water Department (PR&DW), Government of Odisha (GoO), and the District Administration, Dhenkanal are making strides towards instituting district wide approach for Solid Liquid Waste Management (SLWM).