Rural Water

India has many reasons to be concerned about climate change. Its large population depends upon climate-sensitive sectors such as agriculture and forestry for its livelihood.

Additional Rs 40,000 crore allocated to MGNREGA

Jharkhand government launches three schemes to revive rural economy under the MGNREGA

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.

Under JJM, Centre to ensure safe drinking water and scale up activities during monsoon

With Covid-19 spreading its wings across the world, the impact on quality of life and access to basic human rights will be felt exceedingly more in the global south. It is the nature of disasters, to bare the inherent socio-economic inequities in societies, that are invisibilized during normal times. The Covid-19 pandemic, an unprecedented public health disaster, is a case in point.

The conventional freshwater sources available in India are being currently overexploited, leading to widespread environmental degradation and depletion of freshwater resources especially groundwater. To sustain the needs of an increasing population and ecology, our consumption of water far exceeds the rate at which we are recharging water sources. We are faced with water scarcity and will find it hard to meet the future regional demands.

India has the most people in the world without access to safe drinking water (133.9 million). Many studies indicate that poor and marginalized populations are the worst affected from waterborne diseases resulting from the consumption of contaminated water. The issue warrants urgent attention as each year over 140,000 children under age five die from diarrheal diseases alone.

Springs are the key source of water for rural households in Uttarakhand, yet they have seen an overall neglect over the decades with discharge from many springs declining bit by bit. The depletion of aquifers, changes in land use and ecological degradation have led to several initiatives to address springshed management in the state. We speak to Dr.

Maharashtra has the highest COVID-19 cases in the country and the government is taking a slew of measures to flatten the curve. We speak to Mr. Yusuf Kabir, WASH specialist and emergency focal point for UNICEF Mumbai, who is at the forefront of the containment efforts to find out about their efforts towards water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) in urban and rural areas especially to tackle COVID-19 spread.