Deprecated (16384): The ArrayAccess methods will be removed in 4.0.0.Use getParam(), getData() and getQuery() instead. - /home/brlfuser/public_html/src/Controller/ArtileDetailController.php, line: 73
 You can disable deprecation warnings by setting `Error.errorLevel` to `E_ALL & ~E_USER_DEPRECATED` in your config/app.php. [CORE/src/Core/functions.php, line 311]
Code Context


        trigger_error($message, E_USER_DEPRECATED);

    }
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 You can disable deprecation warnings by setting `Error.errorLevel` to `E_ALL & ~E_USER_DEPRECATED` in your config/app.php.'
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deprecationWarning - CORE/src/Core/functions.php, line 311
Cake\Http\ServerRequest::offsetGet() - CORE/src/Http/ServerRequest.php, line 2421
App\Controller\ArtileDetailController::printArticle() - APP/Controller/ArtileDetailController.php, line 73
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Cake\Http\Runner::__invoke() - CORE/src/Http/Runner.php, line 65
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Cake\Http\Runner::__invoke() - CORE/src/Http/Runner.php, line 65
Cake\Http\Runner::run() - CORE/src/Http/Runner.php, line 51
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Deprecated (16384): The ArrayAccess methods will be removed in 4.0.0.Use getParam(), getData() and getQuery() instead. - /home/brlfuser/public_html/src/Controller/ArtileDetailController.php, line: 74
 You can disable deprecation warnings by setting `Error.errorLevel` to `E_ALL & ~E_USER_DEPRECATED` in your config/app.php. [CORE/src/Core/functions.php, line 311]
Code Context


        trigger_error($message, E_USER_DEPRECATED);

    }
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 You can disable deprecation warnings by setting `Error.errorLevel` to `E_ALL & ~E_USER_DEPRECATED` in your config/app.php.'
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deprecationWarning - CORE/src/Core/functions.php, line 311
Cake\Http\ServerRequest::offsetGet() - CORE/src/Http/ServerRequest.php, line 2421
App\Controller\ArtileDetailController::printArticle() - APP/Controller/ArtileDetailController.php, line 74
Cake\Controller\Controller::invokeAction() - CORE/src/Controller/Controller.php, line 610
Cake\Http\ActionDispatcher::_invoke() - CORE/src/Http/ActionDispatcher.php, line 120
Cake\Http\ActionDispatcher::dispatch() - CORE/src/Http/ActionDispatcher.php, line 94
Cake\Http\BaseApplication::__invoke() - CORE/src/Http/BaseApplication.php, line 235
Cake\Http\Runner::__invoke() - CORE/src/Http/Runner.php, line 65
Cake\Routing\Middleware\RoutingMiddleware::__invoke() - CORE/src/Routing/Middleware/RoutingMiddleware.php, line 162
Cake\Http\Runner::__invoke() - CORE/src/Http/Runner.php, line 65
Cake\Routing\Middleware\AssetMiddleware::__invoke() - CORE/src/Routing/Middleware/AssetMiddleware.php, line 88
Cake\Http\Runner::__invoke() - CORE/src/Http/Runner.php, line 65
Cake\Error\Middleware\ErrorHandlerMiddleware::__invoke() - CORE/src/Error/Middleware/ErrorHandlerMiddleware.php, line 96
Cake\Http\Runner::__invoke() - CORE/src/Http/Runner.php, line 65
Cake\Http\Runner::run() - CORE/src/Http/Runner.php, line 51
Cake\Http\Server::run() - CORE/src/Http/Server.php, line 98

Warning (512): Unable to emit headers. Headers sent in file=/home/brlfuser/public_html/vendor/cakephp/cakephp/src/Error/Debugger.php line=853 [CORE/src/Http/ResponseEmitter.php, line 48]
Code Context
            if (Configure::read('debug')) {

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		&#039;id&#039; =&gt; (int) 31154,
		&#039;title&#039; =&gt; &#039;Activists, Academics Write Open Letter to PM Modi on the Drought&#039;,
		&#039;subheading&#039; =&gt; &#039;&#039;,
		&#039;description&#039; =&gt; &#039;&lt;div align=&quot;justify&quot;&gt;
-TheWire.in&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;em&gt;According to the central government&amp;rsquo;s statement to the Supreme Court last week, a third of the India&amp;rsquo;s districts are currently facing a severe drought. This means that at least 33 crore Indians are affected by ongoing the crisis.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
Expressing their deep concern on the issue and the impact it is having on rural populations of the country, and asking that the government take appropriate relief measures immediately, more than 150 academics and activists have written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;/em&gt;&lt;br /&gt;
Dear Mr Prime Minister,&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
We wish to convey our deep collective anxiety about the enormous suffering of the rural poor in large parts of India&amp;rsquo;s countryside as they are battling drought, often for the second or even third consecutive year. In areas where rains have failed, farmers who depend mainly on rainwater to irrigate their crops have no or very low crop yields. Those who rely on irrigation are also affected, with groundwater sinking and streams and reservoirs drying up. All this adds to chronic agrarian distress reflected in a massive slowdown in agricultural growth during the last few years, with no imminent signs of recovery.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
The consequence of this adversity is massive distress movement of populations, causing broken childhoods, interrupted education, life in camps, city pavements or crowded shanties. Add to this the old and the infirm who are left behind, to beg for food or just quietly die. The cattle for whom there is no fodder, sold at distress prices or just abandoned to fend for themselves. And the drying up even of sources of water to drink.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
However, the response of central and state administrations to looming drought is sadly listless, lacking in both urgency and compassion. The scale of MGNREGA works is way below what is required and wages often remain unpaid for months. Even more gravely, the central and state governments are doing far too little to implement the National Food Security Act, three years after it came into force. Had the Act been in place, more than 80% of rural households in the poorer states would be able to secure about half of their monthly cereal requirements almost free of cost. In a drought situation food security entitlements should be made universal.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
In addition, we find no plans in most of the drought-hit regions for feeding the destitute, especially old persons left behind when families migrate, children without care-givers, the disabled and other vulnerable groups. ICDS centres could have been upgraded to supply emergency feeding to the destitute during the drought, but this has not happened. Under Supreme Court orders, school meals should be served on all days, including holidays, in drought-affected areas, but this is rarely the case. Arrangements to augment drinking water supply, including ensuring that marginalised hamlets have functioning tube-wells and transporting water where necessary, are awfully inadequate. There are also few attempts to create fodder banks and cattle camps. Most of these measures used to be a routine part of state response to drought, and were often undertaken with a great sense of urgency, but they are barely being considered today.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
The highest priority of the central government in a drought situation should be to ensure the creation of millions of additional person-days of work in all affected villages. Instead, the government has not even allocated enough funds this year to sustain the level of employment generated last year &amp;ndash; 233 crore person-days according to official data. At current levels of expenditure per person-day, this would cost well over 50,000 crore rupees. Yet the central government has allocated just 38,500 crore rupees to MGNREGA this year, of which more than 12,000 crore rupees are required to clear pending liabilities. These liabilities only prove the distress crores of workers have been put through because of wages left unpaid for months at a time. Unemployment allowance and mandatory compensation for delayed wage payments are also not paid, citing &amp;ldquo;insufficient funds&amp;rdquo;, resulting in a failure of the Act, and its legal safeguards. Most alarming today, is that instead of expanding, MGNREGA is all set to contract in this critical drought year, unless financial allocations are vastly expanded.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
The enormous distress &amp;ndash; of food, drinking water, work, fodder for animals, and dignity &amp;ndash; of hundred of millions is utterly unacceptable. We demand that the central government under your leadership acknowledges these failures and makes rapid amends, by implementing all the traditional relief measures as well as by ensuring full implementation of the National Food Security Act 2013 and the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act 2005 in letter and spirit.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
Signed &amp;ndash;&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aruna Roy, senior activist, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jean Dreze, Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jayati Ghosh, Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Harsh Mander, Activist, Writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Satish Deshpande, Academic, Sociologist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Deep Joshi, senior environmentalist and water activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prabhat Patnaik, Professor Emeritus, Economist, Senior academician&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amit Bhaduri, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vijay Vyas, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Utsa Patnaik, Professor and Senior Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Arundhati Roy, Writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Admiral Ramdas, former Chief of Naval Staff&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Lalita Ramdas, activist, Maharashtra&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Naseeruddin Shah, Actor&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Brinda Karat, Women&amp;rsquo;s leader, Politician&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Medha Patkar, Activist, politician, women&amp;rsquo;s leader&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shabana Azmi, Actor&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kavitha Kuruganti, Activist, leader of farmer&amp;rsquo;s groups&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nivedita Menon, Academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nandita Das, actor&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mukul Kesavan, writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Leela Samson, dancer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ashok Vajpeyi, writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Justice Rajinder Sachar, senior jurist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Syeda Hameed, women&amp;rsquo;s leader, former member Planning Commission&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shyam Benegal, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Himanshu Thakkar, environmentalist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Wajahat Habibullah, former Chief Information Commissioner&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Deepak Sandhu, former Chief Information Commissioner&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shailesh Gandhi, former Central Information Commissioner&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Uma Chakravarty, historian&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ritwick Dutta, environmental legal activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Trilochan Shastry, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jagdeep Chhokar, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Advocate Vrinda Grover&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nandini Sundar, Sociologist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shekhar Singh, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amar Kanwar, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prof C.P.Chandrasekhar, labour economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dilip Simeon, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prithvi Sharma, activist, also on behalf of ICAN&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Maja Daruwala, senior human rights activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mathew Cherian, Helpage&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; M. Krishna, Musician, Writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anand Patwardhan, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Lalit Mathur, former civil servant&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kavita Srivastava, PUCL, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anjali Bhardwaj, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Achin Vinayak, academic and activist, Delhi&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ram Rehman, photographer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Pamela Philipose, journalist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; A.Gandhi , academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rita Anand, senior journalist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nirmala Lakshman, senior journalist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Tripurari Sharma, Drama and Theater, playright&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Harsh Sethi, writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Madhu Bhaduri, former diplomat&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sharmila Tagore, Actor&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amitabh Mukhopadhyay, former auditor, CAG&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mridula Mukherjee, historian&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aditya Mukherjee, historian&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amita Baviskar, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Arundhati Dhuru, activist, UP&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kavita Krishnan, activist, leader of women&amp;rsquo;s groups&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Reetika Khera, Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sanjay Kak, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Baba Adhav, labour leader&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Achyut Das, activist, Odisha&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ajit Ranade, economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kalpana Kannabiran, sociologist, lawyer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vasanth Kannabiran, teacher and activist, Andhra&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Paul Divakar, dalit activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Abha Sur, writer, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rajni Bakshi, writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ravi Chopra, activist, Uttarakhand&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Neelabh Mishra, writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Poornima Chikarmane, Pune&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Zoya Hasan , academic, political scientist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shabnam Hashmi, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rebecca John, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anandalakshmy, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Smita Gupta, Economist, Head of economic cell, AIDWA&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Praveen Jha, Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Gautam Navlakha, senior activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Venkatesh Nayak, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Seema Mustafa, journalist, editor, The Citizen&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Bela Bhatia, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Bezwada Wilson, senior activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Haragopal, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sumit Chakravarty, Editor, Mainstream&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Gargi Chakravarty, Women&amp;rsquo;s activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Patricia Uberoi&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kamal Chenoy, senior academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Janaki Nair, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vipul Mudgal, journalist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Deepa Sinha, Right to Food activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Himanshu, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Uma Pillai, former civil servant&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nikhil Dey, activist, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; N.Rath, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Abey George,academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mahesh Pandya, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jyothi Krishnan, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Balram, activist, Jharkhand&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; AL Rangarajan, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rajaram Singh&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rameshwar Prasad, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anand Murugesan, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Abha Bhaiya, women&amp;rsquo;s activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sagar Rabari, activist, Gujarat&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dhirendhra Singh&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rammanohar Reddy, former editor EPW, senior writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nandini K Oza, water activist, Maharasthra&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Osama Manzar, Digital Empowerment Foundation&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rakesh Sharma&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Pankti Jog, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rakesh Reddy Dubbudu, RTI activist, Telangana&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Subrat Das, economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Umesh Anand, editor, Civil Society&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Charul,singer, cultural activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vinay, singer, writer, musician, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Maya Caroli&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ashwini Kulkarni, activist, Pune&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vibha Puri Das&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Surjit Das&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amrita Johri, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Madhuresh Kumar, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ankur Sarin&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dipak Dholakia&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Navdeep Mathur&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Harinesh, activist, Gujarat&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Persis Ginwalla&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shamsul Islam, theatre activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prafulla Samantara, activist, Odisha&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Lingraj Azad, activist, Odisha&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sunilam, activist, Madhya Pradesh&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aradhana Bhargava&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Meera Chaudhary, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Suniti SR, activist, Pune&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Suhas Kolhekar, activist Pune&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prasad Bagwe&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Gabrielle Dietrich, leader of Women&amp;rsquo;s groups&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Geetha Ramakrishnan, activist Tamil Nadu&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; R. Neelkandan&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; P Chennaiah, activist Telangana&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ramakrishnan Raju, activist, Andhra&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Richa Singh, activist, Uttar Pradesh&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sister Cella&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vimal Bhai, activist, Himachal Pradesh&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jabar Singh, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anand Mazgaonkar&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Krishnakanth&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kamayani Swami, activist, Bihar&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ashish Ranjan, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mahendra Yadav, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Faisal Khan, activist, Haryana&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; JS Walla&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kailash Meena, activist, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amitava Mitra&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aveek Saha&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; BS Rawat&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rajendra Ravi&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shabnam Shaikh&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mahesh Pandya&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; S. Shylendra&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Iqbalkhan Pulli&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Soumen Ray&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ramachandra Prasad, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ravi M.&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dipak Dholakia&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&#039;,
		&#039;credit_writer&#039; =&gt; &#039;TheWire.in, 26 April, 2016, http://thewire.in/2016/04/26/activists-academics-write-open-letter-to-pm-modi-on-the-drought-31573/&#039;,
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-TheWire.in

According to the central government&amp;rsquo;s statement to the Supreme Court last week, a third of the India&amp;rsquo;s districts are currently facing a severe drought. This means that at least 33 crore Indians are affected by ongoing the crisis.

Expressing their deep...&#039;,
	&#039;disp&#039; =&gt; &#039;&lt;div align=&quot;justify&quot;&gt;-TheWire.in&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;em&gt;According to the central government&amp;rsquo;s statement to the Supreme Court last week, a third of the India&amp;rsquo;s districts are currently facing a severe drought. This means that at least 33 crore Indians are affected by ongoing the crisis.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Expressing their deep concern on the issue and the impact it is having on rural populations of the country, and asking that the government take appropriate relief measures immediately, more than 150 academics and activists have written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/em&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Dear Mr Prime Minister,&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;We wish to convey our deep collective anxiety about the enormous suffering of the rural poor in large parts of India&amp;rsquo;s countryside as they are battling drought, often for the second or even third consecutive year. In areas where rains have failed, farmers who depend mainly on rainwater to irrigate their crops have no or very low crop yields. Those who rely on irrigation are also affected, with groundwater sinking and streams and reservoirs drying up. All this adds to chronic agrarian distress reflected in a massive slowdown in agricultural growth during the last few years, with no imminent signs of recovery.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;The consequence of this adversity is massive distress movement of populations, causing broken childhoods, interrupted education, life in camps, city pavements or crowded shanties. Add to this the old and the infirm who are left behind, to beg for food or just quietly die. The cattle for whom there is no fodder, sold at distress prices or just abandoned to fend for themselves. And the drying up even of sources of water to drink.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;However, the response of central and state administrations to looming drought is sadly listless, lacking in both urgency and compassion. The scale of MGNREGA works is way below what is required and wages often remain unpaid for months. Even more gravely, the central and state governments are doing far too little to implement the National Food Security Act, three years after it came into force. Had the Act been in place, more than 80% of rural households in the poorer states would be able to secure about half of their monthly cereal requirements almost free of cost. In a drought situation food security entitlements should be made universal.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;In addition, we find no plans in most of the drought-hit regions for feeding the destitute, especially old persons left behind when families migrate, children without care-givers, the disabled and other vulnerable groups. ICDS centres could have been upgraded to supply emergency feeding to the destitute during the drought, but this has not happened. Under Supreme Court orders, school meals should be served on all days, including holidays, in drought-affected areas, but this is rarely the case. Arrangements to augment drinking water supply, including ensuring that marginalised hamlets have functioning tube-wells and transporting water where necessary, are awfully inadequate. There are also few attempts to create fodder banks and cattle camps. Most of these measures used to be a routine part of state response to drought, and were often undertaken with a great sense of urgency, but they are barely being considered today.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;The highest priority of the central government in a drought situation should be to ensure the creation of millions of additional person-days of work in all affected villages. Instead, the government has not even allocated enough funds this year to sustain the level of employment generated last year &amp;ndash; 233 crore person-days according to official data. At current levels of expenditure per person-day, this would cost well over 50,000 crore rupees. Yet the central government has allocated just 38,500 crore rupees to MGNREGA this year, of which more than 12,000 crore rupees are required to clear pending liabilities. These liabilities only prove the distress crores of workers have been put through because of wages left unpaid for months at a time. Unemployment allowance and mandatory compensation for delayed wage payments are also not paid, citing &amp;ldquo;insufficient funds&amp;rdquo;, resulting in a failure of the Act, and its legal safeguards. Most alarming today, is that instead of expanding, MGNREGA is all set to contract in this critical drought year, unless financial allocations are vastly expanded.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;The enormous distress &amp;ndash; of food, drinking water, work, fodder for animals, and dignity &amp;ndash; of hundred of millions is utterly unacceptable. We demand that the central government under your leadership acknowledges these failures and makes rapid amends, by implementing all the traditional relief measures as well as by ensuring full implementation of the National Food Security Act 2013 and the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act 2005 in letter and spirit.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Signed &amp;ndash;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aruna Roy, senior activist, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jean Dreze, Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jayati Ghosh, Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Harsh Mander, Activist, Writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Satish Deshpande, Academic, Sociologist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Deep Joshi, senior environmentalist and water activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prabhat Patnaik, Professor Emeritus, Economist, Senior academician&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amit Bhaduri, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vijay Vyas, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Utsa Patnaik, Professor and Senior Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Arundhati Roy, Writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Admiral Ramdas, former Chief of Naval Staff&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Lalita Ramdas, activist, Maharashtra&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Naseeruddin Shah, Actor&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Brinda Karat, Women&amp;rsquo;s leader, Politician&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Medha Patkar, Activist, politician, women&amp;rsquo;s leader&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shabana Azmi, Actor&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kavitha Kuruganti, Activist, leader of farmer&amp;rsquo;s groups&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nivedita Menon, Academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nandita Das, actor&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mukul Kesavan, writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Leela Samson, dancer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ashok Vajpeyi, writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Justice Rajinder Sachar, senior jurist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Syeda Hameed, women&amp;rsquo;s leader, former member Planning Commission&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shyam Benegal, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Himanshu Thakkar, environmentalist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Wajahat Habibullah, former Chief Information Commissioner&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Deepak Sandhu, former Chief Information Commissioner&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shailesh Gandhi, former Central Information Commissioner&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Uma Chakravarty, historian&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ritwick Dutta, environmental legal activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Trilochan Shastry, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jagdeep Chhokar, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Advocate Vrinda Grover&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nandini Sundar, Sociologist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shekhar Singh, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amar Kanwar, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prof C.P.Chandrasekhar, labour economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dilip Simeon, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prithvi Sharma, activist, also on behalf of ICAN&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Maja Daruwala, senior human rights activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mathew Cherian, Helpage&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; M. Krishna, Musician, Writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anand Patwardhan, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Lalit Mathur, former civil servant&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kavita Srivastava, PUCL, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anjali Bhardwaj, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Achin Vinayak, academic and activist, Delhi&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ram Rehman, photographer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Pamela Philipose, journalist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; A.Gandhi , academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rita Anand, senior journalist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nirmala Lakshman, senior journalist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Tripurari Sharma, Drama and Theater, playright&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Harsh Sethi, writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Madhu Bhaduri, former diplomat&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sharmila Tagore, Actor&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amitabh Mukhopadhyay, former auditor, CAG&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mridula Mukherjee, historian&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aditya Mukherjee, historian&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amita Baviskar, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Arundhati Dhuru, activist, UP&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kavita Krishnan, activist, leader of women&amp;rsquo;s groups&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Reetika Khera, Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sanjay Kak, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Baba Adhav, labour leader&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Achyut Das, activist, Odisha&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ajit Ranade, economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kalpana Kannabiran, sociologist, lawyer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vasanth Kannabiran, teacher and activist, Andhra&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Paul Divakar, dalit activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Abha Sur, writer, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rajni Bakshi, writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ravi Chopra, activist, Uttarakhand&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Neelabh Mishra, writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Poornima Chikarmane, Pune&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Zoya Hasan , academic, political scientist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shabnam Hashmi, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rebecca John, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anandalakshmy, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Smita Gupta, Economist, Head of economic cell, AIDWA&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Praveen Jha, Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Gautam Navlakha, senior activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Venkatesh Nayak, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Seema Mustafa, journalist, editor, The Citizen&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Bela Bhatia, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Bezwada Wilson, senior activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Haragopal, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sumit Chakravarty, Editor, Mainstream&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Gargi Chakravarty, Women&amp;rsquo;s activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Patricia Uberoi&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kamal Chenoy, senior academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Janaki Nair, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vipul Mudgal, journalist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Deepa Sinha, Right to Food activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Himanshu, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Uma Pillai, former civil servant&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nikhil Dey, activist, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; N.Rath, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Abey George,academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mahesh Pandya, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jyothi Krishnan, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Balram, activist, Jharkhand&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; AL Rangarajan, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rajaram Singh&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rameshwar Prasad, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anand Murugesan, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Abha Bhaiya, women&amp;rsquo;s activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sagar Rabari, activist, Gujarat&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dhirendhra Singh&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rammanohar Reddy, former editor EPW, senior writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nandini K Oza, water activist, Maharasthra&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Osama Manzar, Digital Empowerment Foundation&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rakesh Sharma&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Pankti Jog, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rakesh Reddy Dubbudu, RTI activist, Telangana&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Subrat Das, economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Umesh Anand, editor, Civil Society&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Charul,singer, cultural activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vinay, singer, writer, musician, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Maya Caroli&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ashwini Kulkarni, activist, Pune&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vibha Puri Das&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Surjit Das&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amrita Johri, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Madhuresh Kumar, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ankur Sarin&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dipak Dholakia&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Navdeep Mathur&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Harinesh, activist, Gujarat&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Persis Ginwalla&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shamsul Islam, theatre activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prafulla Samantara, activist, Odisha&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Lingraj Azad, activist, Odisha&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sunilam, activist, Madhya Pradesh&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aradhana Bhargava&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Meera Chaudhary, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Suniti SR, activist, Pune&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Suhas Kolhekar, activist Pune&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prasad Bagwe&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Gabrielle Dietrich, leader of Women&amp;rsquo;s groups&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Geetha Ramakrishnan, activist Tamil Nadu&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; R. 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	&#039;id&#039; =&gt; (int) 31154,
	&#039;title&#039; =&gt; &#039;Activists, Academics Write Open Letter to PM Modi on the Drought&#039;,
	&#039;subheading&#039; =&gt; &#039;&#039;,
	&#039;description&#039; =&gt; &#039;&lt;div align=&quot;justify&quot;&gt;
-TheWire.in&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;em&gt;According to the central government&amp;rsquo;s statement to the Supreme Court last week, a third of the India&amp;rsquo;s districts are currently facing a severe drought. This means that at least 33 crore Indians are affected by ongoing the crisis.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
Expressing their deep concern on the issue and the impact it is having on rural populations of the country, and asking that the government take appropriate relief measures immediately, more than 150 academics and activists have written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;/em&gt;&lt;br /&gt;
Dear Mr Prime Minister,&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
We wish to convey our deep collective anxiety about the enormous suffering of the rural poor in large parts of India&amp;rsquo;s countryside as they are battling drought, often for the second or even third consecutive year. In areas where rains have failed, farmers who depend mainly on rainwater to irrigate their crops have no or very low crop yields. Those who rely on irrigation are also affected, with groundwater sinking and streams and reservoirs drying up. All this adds to chronic agrarian distress reflected in a massive slowdown in agricultural growth during the last few years, with no imminent signs of recovery.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
The consequence of this adversity is massive distress movement of populations, causing broken childhoods, interrupted education, life in camps, city pavements or crowded shanties. Add to this the old and the infirm who are left behind, to beg for food or just quietly die. The cattle for whom there is no fodder, sold at distress prices or just abandoned to fend for themselves. And the drying up even of sources of water to drink.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
However, the response of central and state administrations to looming drought is sadly listless, lacking in both urgency and compassion. The scale of MGNREGA works is way below what is required and wages often remain unpaid for months. Even more gravely, the central and state governments are doing far too little to implement the National Food Security Act, three years after it came into force. Had the Act been in place, more than 80% of rural households in the poorer states would be able to secure about half of their monthly cereal requirements almost free of cost. In a drought situation food security entitlements should be made universal.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
In addition, we find no plans in most of the drought-hit regions for feeding the destitute, especially old persons left behind when families migrate, children without care-givers, the disabled and other vulnerable groups. ICDS centres could have been upgraded to supply emergency feeding to the destitute during the drought, but this has not happened. Under Supreme Court orders, school meals should be served on all days, including holidays, in drought-affected areas, but this is rarely the case. Arrangements to augment drinking water supply, including ensuring that marginalised hamlets have functioning tube-wells and transporting water where necessary, are awfully inadequate. There are also few attempts to create fodder banks and cattle camps. Most of these measures used to be a routine part of state response to drought, and were often undertaken with a great sense of urgency, but they are barely being considered today.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
The highest priority of the central government in a drought situation should be to ensure the creation of millions of additional person-days of work in all affected villages. Instead, the government has not even allocated enough funds this year to sustain the level of employment generated last year &amp;ndash; 233 crore person-days according to official data. At current levels of expenditure per person-day, this would cost well over 50,000 crore rupees. Yet the central government has allocated just 38,500 crore rupees to MGNREGA this year, of which more than 12,000 crore rupees are required to clear pending liabilities. These liabilities only prove the distress crores of workers have been put through because of wages left unpaid for months at a time. Unemployment allowance and mandatory compensation for delayed wage payments are also not paid, citing &amp;ldquo;insufficient funds&amp;rdquo;, resulting in a failure of the Act, and its legal safeguards. Most alarming today, is that instead of expanding, MGNREGA is all set to contract in this critical drought year, unless financial allocations are vastly expanded.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
The enormous distress &amp;ndash; of food, drinking water, work, fodder for animals, and dignity &amp;ndash; of hundred of millions is utterly unacceptable. We demand that the central government under your leadership acknowledges these failures and makes rapid amends, by implementing all the traditional relief measures as well as by ensuring full implementation of the National Food Security Act 2013 and the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act 2005 in letter and spirit.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
Signed &amp;ndash;&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aruna Roy, senior activist, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jean Dreze, Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jayati Ghosh, Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Harsh Mander, Activist, Writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Satish Deshpande, Academic, Sociologist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Deep Joshi, senior environmentalist and water activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prabhat Patnaik, Professor Emeritus, Economist, Senior academician&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amit Bhaduri, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vijay Vyas, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Utsa Patnaik, Professor and Senior Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Arundhati Roy, Writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Admiral Ramdas, former Chief of Naval Staff&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Lalita Ramdas, activist, Maharashtra&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Naseeruddin Shah, Actor&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Brinda Karat, Women&amp;rsquo;s leader, Politician&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Medha Patkar, Activist, politician, women&amp;rsquo;s leader&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shabana Azmi, Actor&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kavitha Kuruganti, Activist, leader of farmer&amp;rsquo;s groups&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nivedita Menon, Academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nandita Das, actor&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mukul Kesavan, writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Leela Samson, dancer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ashok Vajpeyi, writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Justice Rajinder Sachar, senior jurist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Syeda Hameed, women&amp;rsquo;s leader, former member Planning Commission&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shyam Benegal, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Himanshu Thakkar, environmentalist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Wajahat Habibullah, former Chief Information Commissioner&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Deepak Sandhu, former Chief Information Commissioner&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shailesh Gandhi, former Central Information Commissioner&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Uma Chakravarty, historian&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ritwick Dutta, environmental legal activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Trilochan Shastry, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jagdeep Chhokar, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Advocate Vrinda Grover&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nandini Sundar, Sociologist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shekhar Singh, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amar Kanwar, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prof C.P.Chandrasekhar, labour economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dilip Simeon, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prithvi Sharma, activist, also on behalf of ICAN&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Maja Daruwala, senior human rights activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mathew Cherian, Helpage&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; M. Krishna, Musician, Writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anand Patwardhan, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Lalit Mathur, former civil servant&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kavita Srivastava, PUCL, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anjali Bhardwaj, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Achin Vinayak, academic and activist, Delhi&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ram Rehman, photographer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Pamela Philipose, journalist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; A.Gandhi , academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rita Anand, senior journalist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nirmala Lakshman, senior journalist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Tripurari Sharma, Drama and Theater, playright&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Harsh Sethi, writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Madhu Bhaduri, former diplomat&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sharmila Tagore, Actor&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amitabh Mukhopadhyay, former auditor, CAG&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mridula Mukherjee, historian&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aditya Mukherjee, historian&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amita Baviskar, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Arundhati Dhuru, activist, UP&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kavita Krishnan, activist, leader of women&amp;rsquo;s groups&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Reetika Khera, Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sanjay Kak, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Baba Adhav, labour leader&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Achyut Das, activist, Odisha&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ajit Ranade, economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kalpana Kannabiran, sociologist, lawyer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vasanth Kannabiran, teacher and activist, Andhra&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Paul Divakar, dalit activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Abha Sur, writer, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rajni Bakshi, writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ravi Chopra, activist, Uttarakhand&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Neelabh Mishra, writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Poornima Chikarmane, Pune&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Zoya Hasan , academic, political scientist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shabnam Hashmi, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rebecca John, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anandalakshmy, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Smita Gupta, Economist, Head of economic cell, AIDWA&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Praveen Jha, Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Gautam Navlakha, senior activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Venkatesh Nayak, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Seema Mustafa, journalist, editor, The Citizen&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Bela Bhatia, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Bezwada Wilson, senior activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Haragopal, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sumit Chakravarty, Editor, Mainstream&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Gargi Chakravarty, Women&amp;rsquo;s activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Patricia Uberoi&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kamal Chenoy, senior academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Janaki Nair, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vipul Mudgal, journalist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Deepa Sinha, Right to Food activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Himanshu, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Uma Pillai, former civil servant&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nikhil Dey, activist, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; N.Rath, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Abey George,academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mahesh Pandya, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jyothi Krishnan, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Balram, activist, Jharkhand&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; AL Rangarajan, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rajaram Singh&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rameshwar Prasad, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anand Murugesan, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Abha Bhaiya, women&amp;rsquo;s activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sagar Rabari, activist, Gujarat&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dhirendhra Singh&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rammanohar Reddy, former editor EPW, senior writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nandini K Oza, water activist, Maharasthra&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Osama Manzar, Digital Empowerment Foundation&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rakesh Sharma&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Pankti Jog, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rakesh Reddy Dubbudu, RTI activist, Telangana&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Subrat Das, economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Umesh Anand, editor, Civil Society&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Charul,singer, cultural activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vinay, singer, writer, musician, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Maya Caroli&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ashwini Kulkarni, activist, Pune&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vibha Puri Das&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Surjit Das&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amrita Johri, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Madhuresh Kumar, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ankur Sarin&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dipak Dholakia&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Navdeep Mathur&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Harinesh, activist, Gujarat&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Persis Ginwalla&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shamsul Islam, theatre activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prafulla Samantara, activist, Odisha&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Lingraj Azad, activist, Odisha&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sunilam, activist, Madhya Pradesh&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aradhana Bhargava&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Meera Chaudhary, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Suniti SR, activist, Pune&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Suhas Kolhekar, activist Pune&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prasad Bagwe&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Gabrielle Dietrich, leader of Women&amp;rsquo;s groups&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Geetha Ramakrishnan, activist Tamil Nadu&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; R. Neelkandan&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; P Chennaiah, activist Telangana&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ramakrishnan Raju, activist, Andhra&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Richa Singh, activist, Uttar Pradesh&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sister Cella&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vimal Bhai, activist, Himachal Pradesh&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jabar Singh, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anand Mazgaonkar&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Krishnakanth&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kamayani Swami, activist, Bihar&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ashish Ranjan, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mahendra Yadav, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Faisal Khan, activist, Haryana&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; JS Walla&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kailash Meena, activist, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amitava Mitra&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aveek Saha&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; BS Rawat&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rajendra Ravi&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shabnam Shaikh&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mahesh Pandya&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; S. Shylendra&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Iqbalkhan Pulli&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Soumen Ray&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ramachandra Prasad, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ravi M.&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dipak Dholakia&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
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-TheWire.in

According to the central government&amp;rsquo;s statement to the Supreme Court last week, a third of the India&amp;rsquo;s districts are currently facing a severe drought. This means that at least 33 crore Indians are affected by ongoing the crisis.

Expressing their deep...&#039;
$disp = &#039;&lt;div align=&quot;justify&quot;&gt;-TheWire.in&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;em&gt;According to the central government&amp;rsquo;s statement to the Supreme Court last week, a third of the India&amp;rsquo;s districts are currently facing a severe drought. This means that at least 33 crore Indians are affected by ongoing the crisis.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Expressing their deep concern on the issue and the impact it is having on rural populations of the country, and asking that the government take appropriate relief measures immediately, more than 150 academics and activists have written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/em&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Dear Mr Prime Minister,&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;We wish to convey our deep collective anxiety about the enormous suffering of the rural poor in large parts of India&amp;rsquo;s countryside as they are battling drought, often for the second or even third consecutive year. In areas where rains have failed, farmers who depend mainly on rainwater to irrigate their crops have no or very low crop yields. Those who rely on irrigation are also affected, with groundwater sinking and streams and reservoirs drying up. All this adds to chronic agrarian distress reflected in a massive slowdown in agricultural growth during the last few years, with no imminent signs of recovery.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;The consequence of this adversity is massive distress movement of populations, causing broken childhoods, interrupted education, life in camps, city pavements or crowded shanties. Add to this the old and the infirm who are left behind, to beg for food or just quietly die. The cattle for whom there is no fodder, sold at distress prices or just abandoned to fend for themselves. And the drying up even of sources of water to drink.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;However, the response of central and state administrations to looming drought is sadly listless, lacking in both urgency and compassion. The scale of MGNREGA works is way below what is required and wages often remain unpaid for months. Even more gravely, the central and state governments are doing far too little to implement the National Food Security Act, three years after it came into force. Had the Act been in place, more than 80% of rural households in the poorer states would be able to secure about half of their monthly cereal requirements almost free of cost. In a drought situation food security entitlements should be made universal.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;In addition, we find no plans in most of the drought-hit regions for feeding the destitute, especially old persons left behind when families migrate, children without care-givers, the disabled and other vulnerable groups. ICDS centres could have been upgraded to supply emergency feeding to the destitute during the drought, but this has not happened. Under Supreme Court orders, school meals should be served on all days, including holidays, in drought-affected areas, but this is rarely the case. Arrangements to augment drinking water supply, including ensuring that marginalised hamlets have functioning tube-wells and transporting water where necessary, are awfully inadequate. There are also few attempts to create fodder banks and cattle camps. Most of these measures used to be a routine part of state response to drought, and were often undertaken with a great sense of urgency, but they are barely being considered today.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;The highest priority of the central government in a drought situation should be to ensure the creation of millions of additional person-days of work in all affected villages. Instead, the government has not even allocated enough funds this year to sustain the level of employment generated last year &amp;ndash; 233 crore person-days according to official data. At current levels of expenditure per person-day, this would cost well over 50,000 crore rupees. Yet the central government has allocated just 38,500 crore rupees to MGNREGA this year, of which more than 12,000 crore rupees are required to clear pending liabilities. These liabilities only prove the distress crores of workers have been put through because of wages left unpaid for months at a time. Unemployment allowance and mandatory compensation for delayed wage payments are also not paid, citing &amp;ldquo;insufficient funds&amp;rdquo;, resulting in a failure of the Act, and its legal safeguards. Most alarming today, is that instead of expanding, MGNREGA is all set to contract in this critical drought year, unless financial allocations are vastly expanded.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;The enormous distress &amp;ndash; of food, drinking water, work, fodder for animals, and dignity &amp;ndash; of hundred of millions is utterly unacceptable. We demand that the central government under your leadership acknowledges these failures and makes rapid amends, by implementing all the traditional relief measures as well as by ensuring full implementation of the National Food Security Act 2013 and the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act 2005 in letter and spirit.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Signed &amp;ndash;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aruna Roy, senior activist, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jean Dreze, Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jayati Ghosh, Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Harsh Mander, Activist, Writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Satish Deshpande, Academic, Sociologist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Deep Joshi, senior environmentalist and water activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prabhat Patnaik, Professor Emeritus, Economist, Senior academician&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amit Bhaduri, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vijay Vyas, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Utsa Patnaik, Professor and Senior Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Arundhati Roy, Writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Admiral Ramdas, former Chief of Naval Staff&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Lalita Ramdas, activist, Maharashtra&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Naseeruddin Shah, Actor&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Brinda Karat, Women&amp;rsquo;s leader, Politician&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Medha Patkar, Activist, politician, women&amp;rsquo;s leader&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shabana Azmi, Actor&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kavitha Kuruganti, Activist, leader of farmer&amp;rsquo;s groups&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nivedita Menon, Academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nandita Das, actor&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mukul Kesavan, writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Leela Samson, dancer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ashok Vajpeyi, writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Justice Rajinder Sachar, senior jurist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Syeda Hameed, women&amp;rsquo;s leader, former member Planning Commission&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shyam Benegal, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Himanshu Thakkar, environmentalist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Wajahat Habibullah, former Chief Information Commissioner&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Deepak Sandhu, former Chief Information Commissioner&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shailesh Gandhi, former Central Information Commissioner&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Uma Chakravarty, historian&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ritwick Dutta, environmental legal activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Trilochan Shastry, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jagdeep Chhokar, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Advocate Vrinda Grover&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nandini Sundar, Sociologist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shekhar Singh, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amar Kanwar, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prof C.P.Chandrasekhar, labour economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dilip Simeon, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prithvi Sharma, activist, also on behalf of ICAN&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Maja Daruwala, senior human rights activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mathew Cherian, Helpage&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; M. Krishna, Musician, Writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anand Patwardhan, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Lalit Mathur, former civil servant&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kavita Srivastava, PUCL, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anjali Bhardwaj, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Achin Vinayak, academic and activist, Delhi&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ram Rehman, photographer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Pamela Philipose, journalist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; A.Gandhi , academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rita Anand, senior journalist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nirmala Lakshman, senior journalist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Tripurari Sharma, Drama and Theater, playright&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Harsh Sethi, writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Madhu Bhaduri, former diplomat&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sharmila Tagore, Actor&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amitabh Mukhopadhyay, former auditor, CAG&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mridula Mukherjee, historian&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aditya Mukherjee, historian&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amita Baviskar, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Arundhati Dhuru, activist, UP&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kavita Krishnan, activist, leader of women&amp;rsquo;s groups&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Reetika Khera, Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sanjay Kak, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Baba Adhav, labour leader&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Achyut Das, activist, Odisha&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ajit Ranade, economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kalpana Kannabiran, sociologist, lawyer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vasanth Kannabiran, teacher and activist, Andhra&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Paul Divakar, dalit activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Abha Sur, writer, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rajni Bakshi, writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ravi Chopra, activist, Uttarakhand&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Neelabh Mishra, writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Poornima Chikarmane, Pune&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Zoya Hasan , academic, political scientist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shabnam Hashmi, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rebecca John, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anandalakshmy, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Smita Gupta, Economist, Head of economic cell, AIDWA&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Praveen Jha, Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Gautam Navlakha, senior activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Venkatesh Nayak, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Seema Mustafa, journalist, editor, The Citizen&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Bela Bhatia, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Bezwada Wilson, senior activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Haragopal, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sumit Chakravarty, Editor, Mainstream&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Gargi Chakravarty, Women&amp;rsquo;s activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Patricia Uberoi&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kamal Chenoy, senior academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Janaki Nair, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vipul Mudgal, journalist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Deepa Sinha, Right to Food activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Himanshu, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Uma Pillai, former civil servant&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nikhil Dey, activist, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; N.Rath, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Abey George,academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mahesh Pandya, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jyothi Krishnan, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Balram, activist, Jharkhand&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; AL Rangarajan, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rajaram Singh&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rameshwar Prasad, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anand Murugesan, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Abha Bhaiya, women&amp;rsquo;s activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sagar Rabari, activist, Gujarat&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dhirendhra Singh&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rammanohar Reddy, former editor EPW, senior writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nandini K Oza, water activist, Maharasthra&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Osama Manzar, Digital Empowerment Foundation&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rakesh Sharma&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Pankti Jog, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rakesh Reddy Dubbudu, RTI activist, Telangana&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Subrat Das, economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Umesh Anand, editor, Civil Society&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Charul,singer, cultural activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vinay, singer, writer, musician, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Maya Caroli&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ashwini Kulkarni, activist, Pune&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vibha Puri Das&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Surjit Das&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amrita Johri, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Madhuresh Kumar, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ankur Sarin&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dipak Dholakia&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Navdeep Mathur&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Harinesh, activist, Gujarat&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Persis Ginwalla&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shamsul Islam, theatre activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prafulla Samantara, activist, Odisha&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Lingraj Azad, activist, Odisha&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sunilam, activist, Madhya Pradesh&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aradhana Bhargava&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Meera Chaudhary, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Suniti SR, activist, Pune&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Suhas Kolhekar, activist Pune&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prasad Bagwe&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Gabrielle Dietrich, leader of Women&amp;rsquo;s groups&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Geetha Ramakrishnan, activist Tamil Nadu&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; R. Neelkandan&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; P Chennaiah, activist Telangana&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ramakrishnan Raju, activist, Andhra&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Richa Singh, activist, Uttar Pradesh&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sister Cella&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vimal Bhai, activist, Himachal Pradesh&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jabar Singh, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anand Mazgaonkar&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Krishnakanth&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kamayani Swami, activist, Bihar&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ashish Ranjan, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mahendra Yadav, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Faisal Khan, activist, Haryana&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; JS Walla&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kailash Meena, activist, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amitava Mitra&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aveek Saha&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; BS Rawat&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rajendra Ravi&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shabnam Shaikh&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mahesh Pandya&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; S. Shylendra&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Iqbalkhan Pulli&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Soumen Ray&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ramachandra Prasad, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ravi M.&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dipak Dholakia&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&#039;
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According to the central government&rsquo;s statement to the Supreme Court last week, a third of the India&rsquo;s districts are currently facing a severe drought. This means that at least 33 crore Indians are affected by ongoing the crisis.

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                <strong>Activists, Academics Write Open Letter to PM Modi on the Drought</strong></h1>
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                <div align="justify">-TheWire.in<br /><br /><em>According to the central government&rsquo;s statement to the Supreme Court last week, a third of the India&rsquo;s districts are currently facing a severe drought. This means that at least 33 crore Indians are affected by ongoing the crisis.<br /><br />Expressing their deep concern on the issue and the impact it is having on rural populations of the country, and asking that the government take appropriate relief measures immediately, more than 150 academics and activists have written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi.<br /></em><br />Dear Mr Prime Minister,<br /><br />We wish to convey our deep collective anxiety about the enormous suffering of the rural poor in large parts of India&rsquo;s countryside as they are battling drought, often for the second or even third consecutive year. In areas where rains have failed, farmers who depend mainly on rainwater to irrigate their crops have no or very low crop yields. Those who rely on irrigation are also affected, with groundwater sinking and streams and reservoirs drying up. All this adds to chronic agrarian distress reflected in a massive slowdown in agricultural growth during the last few years, with no imminent signs of recovery.<br /><br />The consequence of this adversity is massive distress movement of populations, causing broken childhoods, interrupted education, life in camps, city pavements or crowded shanties. Add to this the old and the infirm who are left behind, to beg for food or just quietly die. The cattle for whom there is no fodder, sold at distress prices or just abandoned to fend for themselves. And the drying up even of sources of water to drink.<br /><br />However, the response of central and state administrations to looming drought is sadly listless, lacking in both urgency and compassion. The scale of MGNREGA works is way below what is required and wages often remain unpaid for months. Even more gravely, the central and state governments are doing far too little to implement the National Food Security Act, three years after it came into force. Had the Act been in place, more than 80% of rural households in the poorer states would be able to secure about half of their monthly cereal requirements almost free of cost. In a drought situation food security entitlements should be made universal.<br /><br />In addition, we find no plans in most of the drought-hit regions for feeding the destitute, especially old persons left behind when families migrate, children without care-givers, the disabled and other vulnerable groups. ICDS centres could have been upgraded to supply emergency feeding to the destitute during the drought, but this has not happened. Under Supreme Court orders, school meals should be served on all days, including holidays, in drought-affected areas, but this is rarely the case. Arrangements to augment drinking water supply, including ensuring that marginalised hamlets have functioning tube-wells and transporting water where necessary, are awfully inadequate. There are also few attempts to create fodder banks and cattle camps. Most of these measures used to be a routine part of state response to drought, and were often undertaken with a great sense of urgency, but they are barely being considered today.<br /><br />The highest priority of the central government in a drought situation should be to ensure the creation of millions of additional person-days of work in all affected villages. Instead, the government has not even allocated enough funds this year to sustain the level of employment generated last year &ndash; 233 crore person-days according to official data. At current levels of expenditure per person-day, this would cost well over 50,000 crore rupees. Yet the central government has allocated just 38,500 crore rupees to MGNREGA this year, of which more than 12,000 crore rupees are required to clear pending liabilities. These liabilities only prove the distress crores of workers have been put through because of wages left unpaid for months at a time. Unemployment allowance and mandatory compensation for delayed wage payments are also not paid, citing &ldquo;insufficient funds&rdquo;, resulting in a failure of the Act, and its legal safeguards. Most alarming today, is that instead of expanding, MGNREGA is all set to contract in this critical drought year, unless financial allocations are vastly expanded.<br /><br />The enormous distress &ndash; of food, drinking water, work, fodder for animals, and dignity &ndash; of hundred of millions is utterly unacceptable. We demand that the central government under your leadership acknowledges these failures and makes rapid amends, by implementing all the traditional relief measures as well as by ensuring full implementation of the National Food Security Act 2013 and the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act 2005 in letter and spirit.<br /><br />Signed &ndash;<br /><br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Aruna Roy, senior activist, Rajasthan<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Jean Dreze, Economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Jayati Ghosh, Economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Harsh Mander, Activist, Writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Satish Deshpande, Academic, Sociologist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Deep Joshi, senior environmentalist and water activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Prabhat Patnaik, Professor Emeritus, Economist, Senior academician<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amit Bhaduri, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vijay Vyas, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Utsa Patnaik, Professor and Senior Economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Arundhati Roy, Writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Admiral Ramdas, former Chief of Naval Staff<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Lalita Ramdas, activist, Maharashtra<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Naseeruddin Shah, Actor<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Brinda Karat, Women&rsquo;s leader, Politician<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Medha Patkar, Activist, politician, women&rsquo;s leader<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shabana Azmi, Actor<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kavitha Kuruganti, Activist, leader of farmer&rsquo;s groups<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nivedita Menon, Academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nandita Das, actor<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mukul Kesavan, writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Leela Samson, dancer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ashok Vajpeyi, writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Justice Rajinder Sachar, senior jurist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Syeda Hameed, women&rsquo;s leader, former member Planning Commission<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shyam Benegal, filmmaker<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Himanshu Thakkar, environmentalist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Wajahat Habibullah, former Chief Information Commissioner<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Deepak Sandhu, former Chief Information Commissioner<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shailesh Gandhi, former Central Information Commissioner<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Uma Chakravarty, historian<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ritwick Dutta, environmental legal activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Trilochan Shastry, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Jagdeep Chhokar, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Advocate Vrinda Grover<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nandini Sundar, Sociologist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shekhar Singh, RTI activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amar Kanwar, filmmaker<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Prof C.P.Chandrasekhar, labour economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Dilip Simeon, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Prithvi Sharma, activist, also on behalf of ICAN<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Maja Daruwala, senior human rights activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mathew Cherian, Helpage<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; M. Krishna, Musician, Writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Anand Patwardhan, filmmaker<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Lalit Mathur, former civil servant<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kavita Srivastava, PUCL, Rajasthan<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Anjali Bhardwaj, RTI activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Achin Vinayak, academic and activist, Delhi<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ram Rehman, photographer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Pamela Philipose, journalist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; A.Gandhi , academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rita Anand, senior journalist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nirmala Lakshman, senior journalist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Tripurari Sharma, Drama and Theater, playright<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Harsh Sethi, writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Madhu Bhaduri, former diplomat<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sharmila Tagore, Actor<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amitabh Mukhopadhyay, former auditor, CAG<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mridula Mukherjee, historian<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Aditya Mukherjee, historian<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amita Baviskar, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Arundhati Dhuru, activist, UP<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kavita Krishnan, activist, leader of women&rsquo;s groups<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Reetika Khera, Economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sanjay Kak, filmmaker<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Baba Adhav, labour leader<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Achyut Das, activist, Odisha<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ajit Ranade, economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kalpana Kannabiran, sociologist, lawyer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vasanth Kannabiran, teacher and activist, Andhra<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Paul Divakar, dalit activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Abha Sur, writer, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rajni Bakshi, writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ravi Chopra, activist, Uttarakhand<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Neelabh Mishra, writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Poornima Chikarmane, Pune<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Zoya Hasan , academic, political scientist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shabnam Hashmi, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rebecca John, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Anandalakshmy, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Smita Gupta, Economist, Head of economic cell, AIDWA<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Praveen Jha, Economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Gautam Navlakha, senior activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Venkatesh Nayak, RTI activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Seema Mustafa, journalist, editor, The Citizen<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Bela Bhatia, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Bezwada Wilson, senior activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Haragopal, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sumit Chakravarty, Editor, Mainstream<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Gargi Chakravarty, Women&rsquo;s activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Patricia Uberoi<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kamal Chenoy, senior academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Janaki Nair, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vipul Mudgal, journalist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Deepa Sinha, Right to Food activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Himanshu, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Uma Pillai, former civil servant<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nikhil Dey, activist, Rajasthan<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; N.Rath, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Abey George,academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mahesh Pandya, ICAN<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Jyothi Krishnan, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Balram, activist, Jharkhand<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; AL Rangarajan, ICAN<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rajaram Singh<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rameshwar Prasad, ICAN<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Anand Murugesan, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Abha Bhaiya, women&rsquo;s activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sagar Rabari, activist, Gujarat<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Dhirendhra Singh<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rammanohar Reddy, former editor EPW, senior writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nandini K Oza, water activist, Maharasthra<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Osama Manzar, Digital Empowerment Foundation<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rakesh Sharma<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Pankti Jog, RTI activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rakesh Reddy Dubbudu, RTI activist, Telangana<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Subrat Das, economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Umesh Anand, editor, Civil Society<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Charul,singer, cultural activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vinay, singer, writer, musician, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Maya Caroli<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ashwini Kulkarni, activist, Pune<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vibha Puri Das<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Surjit Das<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amrita Johri, RTI activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Madhuresh Kumar, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ankur Sarin<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Dipak Dholakia<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Navdeep Mathur<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Harinesh, activist, Gujarat<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Persis Ginwalla<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shamsul Islam, theatre activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Prafulla Samantara, activist, Odisha<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Lingraj Azad, activist, Odisha<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sunilam, activist, Madhya Pradesh<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Aradhana Bhargava<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Meera Chaudhary, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Suniti SR, activist, Pune<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Suhas Kolhekar, activist Pune<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Prasad Bagwe<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Gabrielle Dietrich, leader of Women&rsquo;s groups<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Geetha Ramakrishnan, activist Tamil Nadu<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; R. Neelkandan<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; P Chennaiah, activist Telangana<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ramakrishnan Raju, activist, Andhra<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Richa Singh, activist, Uttar Pradesh<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sister Cella<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vimal Bhai, activist, Himachal Pradesh<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Jabar Singh, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Anand Mazgaonkar<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Krishnakanth<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kamayani Swami, activist, Bihar<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ashish Ranjan, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mahendra Yadav, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Faisal Khan, activist, Haryana<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; JS Walla<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kailash Meena, activist, Rajasthan<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amitava Mitra<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Aveek Saha<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; BS Rawat<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rajendra Ravi<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shabnam Shaikh<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mahesh Pandya<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; S. Shylendra<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Iqbalkhan Pulli<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Soumen Ray<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ramachandra Prasad, ICAN<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ravi M.<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Dipak Dholakia<br /><br /></div>               </font>
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    <link rel="canonical" href="https://im4change.in/<pre class="cake-error"><a href="javascript:void(0);" onclick="document.getElementById('cakeErr67f060f2f27cd-trace').style.display = (document.getElementById('cakeErr67f060f2f27cd-trace').style.display == 'none' ? '' : 'none');"><b>Notice</b> (8)</a>: Undefined variable: urlPrefix [<b>APP/Template/Layout/printlayout.ctp</b>, line <b>8</b>]<div id="cakeErr67f060f2f27cd-trace" class="cake-stack-trace" style="display: none;"><a href="javascript:void(0);" onclick="document.getElementById('cakeErr67f060f2f27cd-code').style.display = (document.getElementById('cakeErr67f060f2f27cd-code').style.display == 'none' ? '' : 'none')">Code</a> <a href="javascript:void(0);" onclick="document.getElementById('cakeErr67f060f2f27cd-context').style.display = (document.getElementById('cakeErr67f060f2f27cd-context').style.display == 'none' ? '' : 'none')">Context</a><pre id="cakeErr67f060f2f27cd-code" class="cake-code-dump" style="display: none;"><code><span style="color: #000000"><span style="color: #0000BB"></span><span style="color: #007700">&lt;</span><span style="color: #0000BB">head</span><span style="color: #007700">&gt;
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		&#039;id&#039; =&gt; (int) 31154,
		&#039;title&#039; =&gt; &#039;Activists, Academics Write Open Letter to PM Modi on the Drought&#039;,
		&#039;subheading&#039; =&gt; &#039;&#039;,
		&#039;description&#039; =&gt; &#039;&lt;div align=&quot;justify&quot;&gt;
-TheWire.in&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;em&gt;According to the central government&amp;rsquo;s statement to the Supreme Court last week, a third of the India&amp;rsquo;s districts are currently facing a severe drought. This means that at least 33 crore Indians are affected by ongoing the crisis.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
Expressing their deep concern on the issue and the impact it is having on rural populations of the country, and asking that the government take appropriate relief measures immediately, more than 150 academics and activists have written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;/em&gt;&lt;br /&gt;
Dear Mr Prime Minister,&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
We wish to convey our deep collective anxiety about the enormous suffering of the rural poor in large parts of India&amp;rsquo;s countryside as they are battling drought, often for the second or even third consecutive year. In areas where rains have failed, farmers who depend mainly on rainwater to irrigate their crops have no or very low crop yields. Those who rely on irrigation are also affected, with groundwater sinking and streams and reservoirs drying up. All this adds to chronic agrarian distress reflected in a massive slowdown in agricultural growth during the last few years, with no imminent signs of recovery.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
The consequence of this adversity is massive distress movement of populations, causing broken childhoods, interrupted education, life in camps, city pavements or crowded shanties. Add to this the old and the infirm who are left behind, to beg for food or just quietly die. The cattle for whom there is no fodder, sold at distress prices or just abandoned to fend for themselves. And the drying up even of sources of water to drink.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
However, the response of central and state administrations to looming drought is sadly listless, lacking in both urgency and compassion. The scale of MGNREGA works is way below what is required and wages often remain unpaid for months. Even more gravely, the central and state governments are doing far too little to implement the National Food Security Act, three years after it came into force. Had the Act been in place, more than 80% of rural households in the poorer states would be able to secure about half of their monthly cereal requirements almost free of cost. In a drought situation food security entitlements should be made universal.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
In addition, we find no plans in most of the drought-hit regions for feeding the destitute, especially old persons left behind when families migrate, children without care-givers, the disabled and other vulnerable groups. ICDS centres could have been upgraded to supply emergency feeding to the destitute during the drought, but this has not happened. Under Supreme Court orders, school meals should be served on all days, including holidays, in drought-affected areas, but this is rarely the case. Arrangements to augment drinking water supply, including ensuring that marginalised hamlets have functioning tube-wells and transporting water where necessary, are awfully inadequate. There are also few attempts to create fodder banks and cattle camps. Most of these measures used to be a routine part of state response to drought, and were often undertaken with a great sense of urgency, but they are barely being considered today.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
The highest priority of the central government in a drought situation should be to ensure the creation of millions of additional person-days of work in all affected villages. Instead, the government has not even allocated enough funds this year to sustain the level of employment generated last year &amp;ndash; 233 crore person-days according to official data. At current levels of expenditure per person-day, this would cost well over 50,000 crore rupees. Yet the central government has allocated just 38,500 crore rupees to MGNREGA this year, of which more than 12,000 crore rupees are required to clear pending liabilities. These liabilities only prove the distress crores of workers have been put through because of wages left unpaid for months at a time. Unemployment allowance and mandatory compensation for delayed wage payments are also not paid, citing &amp;ldquo;insufficient funds&amp;rdquo;, resulting in a failure of the Act, and its legal safeguards. Most alarming today, is that instead of expanding, MGNREGA is all set to contract in this critical drought year, unless financial allocations are vastly expanded.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
The enormous distress &amp;ndash; of food, drinking water, work, fodder for animals, and dignity &amp;ndash; of hundred of millions is utterly unacceptable. We demand that the central government under your leadership acknowledges these failures and makes rapid amends, by implementing all the traditional relief measures as well as by ensuring full implementation of the National Food Security Act 2013 and the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act 2005 in letter and spirit.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
Signed &amp;ndash;&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aruna Roy, senior activist, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jean Dreze, Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jayati Ghosh, Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Harsh Mander, Activist, Writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Satish Deshpande, Academic, Sociologist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Deep Joshi, senior environmentalist and water activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prabhat Patnaik, Professor Emeritus, Economist, Senior academician&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amit Bhaduri, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vijay Vyas, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Utsa Patnaik, Professor and Senior Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Arundhati Roy, Writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Admiral Ramdas, former Chief of Naval Staff&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Lalita Ramdas, activist, Maharashtra&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Naseeruddin Shah, Actor&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Brinda Karat, Women&amp;rsquo;s leader, Politician&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Medha Patkar, Activist, politician, women&amp;rsquo;s leader&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shabana Azmi, Actor&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kavitha Kuruganti, Activist, leader of farmer&amp;rsquo;s groups&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nivedita Menon, Academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nandita Das, actor&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mukul Kesavan, writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Leela Samson, dancer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ashok Vajpeyi, writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Justice Rajinder Sachar, senior jurist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Syeda Hameed, women&amp;rsquo;s leader, former member Planning Commission&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shyam Benegal, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Himanshu Thakkar, environmentalist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Wajahat Habibullah, former Chief Information Commissioner&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Deepak Sandhu, former Chief Information Commissioner&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shailesh Gandhi, former Central Information Commissioner&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Uma Chakravarty, historian&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ritwick Dutta, environmental legal activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Trilochan Shastry, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jagdeep Chhokar, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Advocate Vrinda Grover&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nandini Sundar, Sociologist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shekhar Singh, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amar Kanwar, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prof C.P.Chandrasekhar, labour economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dilip Simeon, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prithvi Sharma, activist, also on behalf of ICAN&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Maja Daruwala, senior human rights activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mathew Cherian, Helpage&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; M. Krishna, Musician, Writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anand Patwardhan, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Lalit Mathur, former civil servant&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kavita Srivastava, PUCL, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anjali Bhardwaj, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Achin Vinayak, academic and activist, Delhi&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ram Rehman, photographer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Pamela Philipose, journalist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; A.Gandhi , academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rita Anand, senior journalist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nirmala Lakshman, senior journalist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Tripurari Sharma, Drama and Theater, playright&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Harsh Sethi, writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Madhu Bhaduri, former diplomat&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sharmila Tagore, Actor&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amitabh Mukhopadhyay, former auditor, CAG&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mridula Mukherjee, historian&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aditya Mukherjee, historian&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amita Baviskar, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Arundhati Dhuru, activist, UP&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kavita Krishnan, activist, leader of women&amp;rsquo;s groups&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Reetika Khera, Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sanjay Kak, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Baba Adhav, labour leader&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Achyut Das, activist, Odisha&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ajit Ranade, economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kalpana Kannabiran, sociologist, lawyer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vasanth Kannabiran, teacher and activist, Andhra&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Paul Divakar, dalit activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Abha Sur, writer, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rajni Bakshi, writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ravi Chopra, activist, Uttarakhand&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Neelabh Mishra, writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Poornima Chikarmane, Pune&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Zoya Hasan , academic, political scientist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shabnam Hashmi, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rebecca John, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anandalakshmy, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Smita Gupta, Economist, Head of economic cell, AIDWA&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Praveen Jha, Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Gautam Navlakha, senior activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Venkatesh Nayak, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Seema Mustafa, journalist, editor, The Citizen&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Bela Bhatia, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Bezwada Wilson, senior activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Haragopal, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sumit Chakravarty, Editor, Mainstream&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Gargi Chakravarty, Women&amp;rsquo;s activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Patricia Uberoi&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kamal Chenoy, senior academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Janaki Nair, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vipul Mudgal, journalist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Deepa Sinha, Right to Food activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Himanshu, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Uma Pillai, former civil servant&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nikhil Dey, activist, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; N.Rath, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Abey George,academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mahesh Pandya, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jyothi Krishnan, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Balram, activist, Jharkhand&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; AL Rangarajan, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rajaram Singh&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rameshwar Prasad, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anand Murugesan, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Abha Bhaiya, women&amp;rsquo;s activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sagar Rabari, activist, Gujarat&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dhirendhra Singh&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rammanohar Reddy, former editor EPW, senior writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nandini K Oza, water activist, Maharasthra&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Osama Manzar, Digital Empowerment Foundation&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rakesh Sharma&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Pankti Jog, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rakesh Reddy Dubbudu, RTI activist, Telangana&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Subrat Das, economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Umesh Anand, editor, Civil Society&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Charul,singer, cultural activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vinay, singer, writer, musician, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Maya Caroli&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ashwini Kulkarni, activist, Pune&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vibha Puri Das&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Surjit Das&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amrita Johri, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Madhuresh Kumar, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ankur Sarin&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dipak Dholakia&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Navdeep Mathur&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Harinesh, activist, Gujarat&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Persis Ginwalla&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shamsul Islam, theatre activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prafulla Samantara, activist, Odisha&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Lingraj Azad, activist, Odisha&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sunilam, activist, Madhya Pradesh&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aradhana Bhargava&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Meera Chaudhary, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Suniti SR, activist, Pune&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Suhas Kolhekar, activist Pune&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prasad Bagwe&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Gabrielle Dietrich, leader of Women&amp;rsquo;s groups&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Geetha Ramakrishnan, activist Tamil Nadu&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; R. Neelkandan&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; P Chennaiah, activist Telangana&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ramakrishnan Raju, activist, Andhra&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Richa Singh, activist, Uttar Pradesh&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sister Cella&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vimal Bhai, activist, Himachal Pradesh&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jabar Singh, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anand Mazgaonkar&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Krishnakanth&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kamayani Swami, activist, Bihar&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ashish Ranjan, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mahendra Yadav, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Faisal Khan, activist, Haryana&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; JS Walla&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kailash Meena, activist, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amitava Mitra&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aveek Saha&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; BS Rawat&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rajendra Ravi&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shabnam Shaikh&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mahesh Pandya&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; S. Shylendra&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Iqbalkhan Pulli&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Soumen Ray&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ramachandra Prasad, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ravi M.&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dipak Dholakia&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
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-TheWire.in

According to the central government&amp;rsquo;s statement to the Supreme Court last week, a third of the India&amp;rsquo;s districts are currently facing a severe drought. This means that at least 33 crore Indians are affected by ongoing the crisis.

Expressing their deep...&#039;,
	&#039;disp&#039; =&gt; &#039;&lt;div align=&quot;justify&quot;&gt;-TheWire.in&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;em&gt;According to the central government&amp;rsquo;s statement to the Supreme Court last week, a third of the India&amp;rsquo;s districts are currently facing a severe drought. This means that at least 33 crore Indians are affected by ongoing the crisis.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Expressing their deep concern on the issue and the impact it is having on rural populations of the country, and asking that the government take appropriate relief measures immediately, more than 150 academics and activists have written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/em&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Dear Mr Prime Minister,&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;We wish to convey our deep collective anxiety about the enormous suffering of the rural poor in large parts of India&amp;rsquo;s countryside as they are battling drought, often for the second or even third consecutive year. In areas where rains have failed, farmers who depend mainly on rainwater to irrigate their crops have no or very low crop yields. Those who rely on irrigation are also affected, with groundwater sinking and streams and reservoirs drying up. All this adds to chronic agrarian distress reflected in a massive slowdown in agricultural growth during the last few years, with no imminent signs of recovery.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;The consequence of this adversity is massive distress movement of populations, causing broken childhoods, interrupted education, life in camps, city pavements or crowded shanties. Add to this the old and the infirm who are left behind, to beg for food or just quietly die. The cattle for whom there is no fodder, sold at distress prices or just abandoned to fend for themselves. And the drying up even of sources of water to drink.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;However, the response of central and state administrations to looming drought is sadly listless, lacking in both urgency and compassion. The scale of MGNREGA works is way below what is required and wages often remain unpaid for months. Even more gravely, the central and state governments are doing far too little to implement the National Food Security Act, three years after it came into force. Had the Act been in place, more than 80% of rural households in the poorer states would be able to secure about half of their monthly cereal requirements almost free of cost. In a drought situation food security entitlements should be made universal.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;In addition, we find no plans in most of the drought-hit regions for feeding the destitute, especially old persons left behind when families migrate, children without care-givers, the disabled and other vulnerable groups. ICDS centres could have been upgraded to supply emergency feeding to the destitute during the drought, but this has not happened. Under Supreme Court orders, school meals should be served on all days, including holidays, in drought-affected areas, but this is rarely the case. Arrangements to augment drinking water supply, including ensuring that marginalised hamlets have functioning tube-wells and transporting water where necessary, are awfully inadequate. There are also few attempts to create fodder banks and cattle camps. Most of these measures used to be a routine part of state response to drought, and were often undertaken with a great sense of urgency, but they are barely being considered today.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;The highest priority of the central government in a drought situation should be to ensure the creation of millions of additional person-days of work in all affected villages. Instead, the government has not even allocated enough funds this year to sustain the level of employment generated last year &amp;ndash; 233 crore person-days according to official data. At current levels of expenditure per person-day, this would cost well over 50,000 crore rupees. Yet the central government has allocated just 38,500 crore rupees to MGNREGA this year, of which more than 12,000 crore rupees are required to clear pending liabilities. These liabilities only prove the distress crores of workers have been put through because of wages left unpaid for months at a time. Unemployment allowance and mandatory compensation for delayed wage payments are also not paid, citing &amp;ldquo;insufficient funds&amp;rdquo;, resulting in a failure of the Act, and its legal safeguards. Most alarming today, is that instead of expanding, MGNREGA is all set to contract in this critical drought year, unless financial allocations are vastly expanded.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;The enormous distress &amp;ndash; of food, drinking water, work, fodder for animals, and dignity &amp;ndash; of hundred of millions is utterly unacceptable. We demand that the central government under your leadership acknowledges these failures and makes rapid amends, by implementing all the traditional relief measures as well as by ensuring full implementation of the National Food Security Act 2013 and the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act 2005 in letter and spirit.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Signed &amp;ndash;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aruna Roy, senior activist, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jean Dreze, Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jayati Ghosh, Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Harsh Mander, Activist, Writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Satish Deshpande, Academic, Sociologist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Deep Joshi, senior environmentalist and water activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prabhat Patnaik, Professor Emeritus, Economist, Senior academician&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amit Bhaduri, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vijay Vyas, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Utsa Patnaik, Professor and Senior Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Arundhati Roy, Writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Admiral Ramdas, former Chief of Naval Staff&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Lalita Ramdas, activist, Maharashtra&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Naseeruddin Shah, Actor&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Brinda Karat, Women&amp;rsquo;s leader, Politician&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Medha Patkar, Activist, politician, women&amp;rsquo;s leader&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shabana Azmi, Actor&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kavitha Kuruganti, Activist, leader of farmer&amp;rsquo;s groups&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nivedita Menon, Academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nandita Das, actor&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mukul Kesavan, writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Leela Samson, dancer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ashok Vajpeyi, writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Justice Rajinder Sachar, senior jurist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Syeda Hameed, women&amp;rsquo;s leader, former member Planning Commission&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shyam Benegal, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Himanshu Thakkar, environmentalist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Wajahat Habibullah, former Chief Information Commissioner&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Deepak Sandhu, former Chief Information Commissioner&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shailesh Gandhi, former Central Information Commissioner&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Uma Chakravarty, historian&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ritwick Dutta, environmental legal activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Trilochan Shastry, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jagdeep Chhokar, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Advocate Vrinda Grover&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nandini Sundar, Sociologist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shekhar Singh, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amar Kanwar, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prof C.P.Chandrasekhar, labour economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dilip Simeon, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prithvi Sharma, activist, also on behalf of ICAN&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Maja Daruwala, senior human rights activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mathew Cherian, Helpage&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; M. Krishna, Musician, Writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anand Patwardhan, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Lalit Mathur, former civil servant&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kavita Srivastava, PUCL, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anjali Bhardwaj, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Achin Vinayak, academic and activist, Delhi&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ram Rehman, photographer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Pamela Philipose, journalist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; A.Gandhi , academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rita Anand, senior journalist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nirmala Lakshman, senior journalist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Tripurari Sharma, Drama and Theater, playright&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Harsh Sethi, writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Madhu Bhaduri, former diplomat&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sharmila Tagore, Actor&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amitabh Mukhopadhyay, former auditor, CAG&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mridula Mukherjee, historian&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aditya Mukherjee, historian&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amita Baviskar, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Arundhati Dhuru, activist, UP&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kavita Krishnan, activist, leader of women&amp;rsquo;s groups&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Reetika Khera, Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sanjay Kak, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Baba Adhav, labour leader&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Achyut Das, activist, Odisha&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ajit Ranade, economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kalpana Kannabiran, sociologist, lawyer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vasanth Kannabiran, teacher and activist, Andhra&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Paul Divakar, dalit activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Abha Sur, writer, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rajni Bakshi, writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ravi Chopra, activist, Uttarakhand&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Neelabh Mishra, writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Poornima Chikarmane, Pune&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Zoya Hasan , academic, political scientist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shabnam Hashmi, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rebecca John, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anandalakshmy, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Smita Gupta, Economist, Head of economic cell, AIDWA&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Praveen Jha, Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Gautam Navlakha, senior activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Venkatesh Nayak, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Seema Mustafa, journalist, editor, The Citizen&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Bela Bhatia, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Bezwada Wilson, senior activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Haragopal, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sumit Chakravarty, Editor, Mainstream&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Gargi Chakravarty, Women&amp;rsquo;s activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Patricia Uberoi&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kamal Chenoy, senior academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Janaki Nair, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vipul Mudgal, journalist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Deepa Sinha, Right to Food activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Himanshu, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Uma Pillai, former civil servant&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nikhil Dey, activist, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; N.Rath, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Abey George,academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mahesh Pandya, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jyothi Krishnan, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Balram, activist, Jharkhand&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; AL Rangarajan, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rajaram Singh&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rameshwar Prasad, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anand Murugesan, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Abha Bhaiya, women&amp;rsquo;s activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sagar Rabari, activist, Gujarat&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dhirendhra Singh&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rammanohar Reddy, former editor EPW, senior writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nandini K Oza, water activist, Maharasthra&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Osama Manzar, Digital Empowerment Foundation&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rakesh Sharma&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Pankti Jog, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rakesh Reddy Dubbudu, RTI activist, Telangana&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Subrat Das, economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Umesh Anand, editor, Civil Society&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Charul,singer, cultural activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vinay, singer, writer, musician, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Maya Caroli&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ashwini Kulkarni, activist, Pune&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vibha Puri Das&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Surjit Das&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amrita Johri, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Madhuresh Kumar, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ankur Sarin&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dipak Dholakia&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Navdeep Mathur&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Harinesh, activist, Gujarat&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Persis Ginwalla&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shamsul Islam, theatre activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prafulla Samantara, activist, Odisha&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Lingraj Azad, activist, Odisha&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sunilam, activist, Madhya Pradesh&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aradhana Bhargava&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Meera Chaudhary, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Suniti SR, activist, Pune&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Suhas Kolhekar, activist Pune&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prasad Bagwe&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Gabrielle Dietrich, leader of Women&amp;rsquo;s groups&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Geetha Ramakrishnan, activist Tamil Nadu&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; R. Neelkandan&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; P Chennaiah, activist Telangana&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ramakrishnan Raju, activist, Andhra&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Richa Singh, activist, Uttar Pradesh&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sister Cella&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vimal Bhai, activist, Himachal Pradesh&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jabar Singh, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anand Mazgaonkar&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Krishnakanth&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kamayani Swami, activist, Bihar&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ashish Ranjan, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mahendra Yadav, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Faisal Khan, activist, Haryana&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; JS Walla&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kailash Meena, activist, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amitava Mitra&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aveek Saha&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; BS Rawat&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rajendra Ravi&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shabnam Shaikh&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mahesh Pandya&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; S. Shylendra&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Iqbalkhan Pulli&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Soumen Ray&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ramachandra Prasad, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ravi M.&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dipak Dholakia&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&#039;,
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	&#039;id&#039; =&gt; (int) 31154,
	&#039;title&#039; =&gt; &#039;Activists, Academics Write Open Letter to PM Modi on the Drought&#039;,
	&#039;subheading&#039; =&gt; &#039;&#039;,
	&#039;description&#039; =&gt; &#039;&lt;div align=&quot;justify&quot;&gt;
-TheWire.in&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;em&gt;According to the central government&amp;rsquo;s statement to the Supreme Court last week, a third of the India&amp;rsquo;s districts are currently facing a severe drought. This means that at least 33 crore Indians are affected by ongoing the crisis.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
Expressing their deep concern on the issue and the impact it is having on rural populations of the country, and asking that the government take appropriate relief measures immediately, more than 150 academics and activists have written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;/em&gt;&lt;br /&gt;
Dear Mr Prime Minister,&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
We wish to convey our deep collective anxiety about the enormous suffering of the rural poor in large parts of India&amp;rsquo;s countryside as they are battling drought, often for the second or even third consecutive year. In areas where rains have failed, farmers who depend mainly on rainwater to irrigate their crops have no or very low crop yields. Those who rely on irrigation are also affected, with groundwater sinking and streams and reservoirs drying up. All this adds to chronic agrarian distress reflected in a massive slowdown in agricultural growth during the last few years, with no imminent signs of recovery.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
The consequence of this adversity is massive distress movement of populations, causing broken childhoods, interrupted education, life in camps, city pavements or crowded shanties. Add to this the old and the infirm who are left behind, to beg for food or just quietly die. The cattle for whom there is no fodder, sold at distress prices or just abandoned to fend for themselves. And the drying up even of sources of water to drink.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
However, the response of central and state administrations to looming drought is sadly listless, lacking in both urgency and compassion. The scale of MGNREGA works is way below what is required and wages often remain unpaid for months. Even more gravely, the central and state governments are doing far too little to implement the National Food Security Act, three years after it came into force. Had the Act been in place, more than 80% of rural households in the poorer states would be able to secure about half of their monthly cereal requirements almost free of cost. In a drought situation food security entitlements should be made universal.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
In addition, we find no plans in most of the drought-hit regions for feeding the destitute, especially old persons left behind when families migrate, children without care-givers, the disabled and other vulnerable groups. ICDS centres could have been upgraded to supply emergency feeding to the destitute during the drought, but this has not happened. Under Supreme Court orders, school meals should be served on all days, including holidays, in drought-affected areas, but this is rarely the case. Arrangements to augment drinking water supply, including ensuring that marginalised hamlets have functioning tube-wells and transporting water where necessary, are awfully inadequate. There are also few attempts to create fodder banks and cattle camps. Most of these measures used to be a routine part of state response to drought, and were often undertaken with a great sense of urgency, but they are barely being considered today.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
The highest priority of the central government in a drought situation should be to ensure the creation of millions of additional person-days of work in all affected villages. Instead, the government has not even allocated enough funds this year to sustain the level of employment generated last year &amp;ndash; 233 crore person-days according to official data. At current levels of expenditure per person-day, this would cost well over 50,000 crore rupees. Yet the central government has allocated just 38,500 crore rupees to MGNREGA this year, of which more than 12,000 crore rupees are required to clear pending liabilities. These liabilities only prove the distress crores of workers have been put through because of wages left unpaid for months at a time. Unemployment allowance and mandatory compensation for delayed wage payments are also not paid, citing &amp;ldquo;insufficient funds&amp;rdquo;, resulting in a failure of the Act, and its legal safeguards. Most alarming today, is that instead of expanding, MGNREGA is all set to contract in this critical drought year, unless financial allocations are vastly expanded.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
The enormous distress &amp;ndash; of food, drinking water, work, fodder for animals, and dignity &amp;ndash; of hundred of millions is utterly unacceptable. We demand that the central government under your leadership acknowledges these failures and makes rapid amends, by implementing all the traditional relief measures as well as by ensuring full implementation of the National Food Security Act 2013 and the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act 2005 in letter and spirit.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
Signed &amp;ndash;&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aruna Roy, senior activist, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jean Dreze, Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jayati Ghosh, Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Harsh Mander, Activist, Writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Satish Deshpande, Academic, Sociologist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Deep Joshi, senior environmentalist and water activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prabhat Patnaik, Professor Emeritus, Economist, Senior academician&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amit Bhaduri, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vijay Vyas, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Utsa Patnaik, Professor and Senior Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Arundhati Roy, Writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Admiral Ramdas, former Chief of Naval Staff&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Lalita Ramdas, activist, Maharashtra&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Naseeruddin Shah, Actor&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Brinda Karat, Women&amp;rsquo;s leader, Politician&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Medha Patkar, Activist, politician, women&amp;rsquo;s leader&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shabana Azmi, Actor&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kavitha Kuruganti, Activist, leader of farmer&amp;rsquo;s groups&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nivedita Menon, Academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nandita Das, actor&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mukul Kesavan, writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Leela Samson, dancer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ashok Vajpeyi, writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Justice Rajinder Sachar, senior jurist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Syeda Hameed, women&amp;rsquo;s leader, former member Planning Commission&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shyam Benegal, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Himanshu Thakkar, environmentalist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Wajahat Habibullah, former Chief Information Commissioner&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Deepak Sandhu, former Chief Information Commissioner&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shailesh Gandhi, former Central Information Commissioner&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Uma Chakravarty, historian&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ritwick Dutta, environmental legal activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Trilochan Shastry, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jagdeep Chhokar, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Advocate Vrinda Grover&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nandini Sundar, Sociologist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shekhar Singh, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amar Kanwar, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prof C.P.Chandrasekhar, labour economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dilip Simeon, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prithvi Sharma, activist, also on behalf of ICAN&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Maja Daruwala, senior human rights activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mathew Cherian, Helpage&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; M. Krishna, Musician, Writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anand Patwardhan, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Lalit Mathur, former civil servant&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kavita Srivastava, PUCL, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anjali Bhardwaj, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Achin Vinayak, academic and activist, Delhi&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ram Rehman, photographer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Pamela Philipose, journalist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; A.Gandhi , academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rita Anand, senior journalist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nirmala Lakshman, senior journalist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Tripurari Sharma, Drama and Theater, playright&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Harsh Sethi, writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Madhu Bhaduri, former diplomat&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sharmila Tagore, Actor&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amitabh Mukhopadhyay, former auditor, CAG&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mridula Mukherjee, historian&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aditya Mukherjee, historian&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amita Baviskar, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Arundhati Dhuru, activist, UP&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kavita Krishnan, activist, leader of women&amp;rsquo;s groups&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Reetika Khera, Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sanjay Kak, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Baba Adhav, labour leader&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Achyut Das, activist, Odisha&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ajit Ranade, economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kalpana Kannabiran, sociologist, lawyer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vasanth Kannabiran, teacher and activist, Andhra&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Paul Divakar, dalit activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Abha Sur, writer, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rajni Bakshi, writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ravi Chopra, activist, Uttarakhand&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Neelabh Mishra, writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Poornima Chikarmane, Pune&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Zoya Hasan , academic, political scientist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shabnam Hashmi, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rebecca John, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anandalakshmy, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Smita Gupta, Economist, Head of economic cell, AIDWA&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Praveen Jha, Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Gautam Navlakha, senior activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Venkatesh Nayak, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Seema Mustafa, journalist, editor, The Citizen&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Bela Bhatia, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Bezwada Wilson, senior activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Haragopal, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sumit Chakravarty, Editor, Mainstream&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Gargi Chakravarty, Women&amp;rsquo;s activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Patricia Uberoi&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kamal Chenoy, senior academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Janaki Nair, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vipul Mudgal, journalist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Deepa Sinha, Right to Food activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Himanshu, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Uma Pillai, former civil servant&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nikhil Dey, activist, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; N.Rath, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Abey George,academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mahesh Pandya, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jyothi Krishnan, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Balram, activist, Jharkhand&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; AL Rangarajan, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rajaram Singh&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rameshwar Prasad, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anand Murugesan, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Abha Bhaiya, women&amp;rsquo;s activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sagar Rabari, activist, Gujarat&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dhirendhra Singh&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rammanohar Reddy, former editor EPW, senior writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nandini K Oza, water activist, Maharasthra&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Osama Manzar, Digital Empowerment Foundation&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rakesh Sharma&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Pankti Jog, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rakesh Reddy Dubbudu, RTI activist, Telangana&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Subrat Das, economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Umesh Anand, editor, Civil Society&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Charul,singer, cultural activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vinay, singer, writer, musician, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Maya Caroli&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ashwini Kulkarni, activist, Pune&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vibha Puri Das&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Surjit Das&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amrita Johri, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Madhuresh Kumar, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ankur Sarin&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dipak Dholakia&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Navdeep Mathur&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Harinesh, activist, Gujarat&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Persis Ginwalla&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shamsul Islam, theatre activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prafulla Samantara, activist, Odisha&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Lingraj Azad, activist, Odisha&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sunilam, activist, Madhya Pradesh&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aradhana Bhargava&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Meera Chaudhary, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Suniti SR, activist, Pune&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Suhas Kolhekar, activist Pune&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prasad Bagwe&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Gabrielle Dietrich, leader of Women&amp;rsquo;s groups&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Geetha Ramakrishnan, activist Tamil Nadu&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; R. Neelkandan&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; P Chennaiah, activist Telangana&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ramakrishnan Raju, activist, Andhra&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Richa Singh, activist, Uttar Pradesh&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sister Cella&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vimal Bhai, activist, Himachal Pradesh&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jabar Singh, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anand Mazgaonkar&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Krishnakanth&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kamayani Swami, activist, Bihar&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ashish Ranjan, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mahendra Yadav, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Faisal Khan, activist, Haryana&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; JS Walla&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kailash Meena, activist, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amitava Mitra&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aveek Saha&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; BS Rawat&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rajendra Ravi&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shabnam Shaikh&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mahesh Pandya&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; S. Shylendra&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Iqbalkhan Pulli&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Soumen Ray&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ramachandra Prasad, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ravi M.&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dipak Dholakia&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
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$metaTitle = &#039;LATEST NEWS UPDATES | Activists, Academics Write Open Letter to PM Modi on the Drought&#039;
$metaKeywords = &#039;drought,Employment,Livelihood Security,MGNREGS,NREGA,mgnrega,NREGS,Fodder&#039;
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-TheWire.in

According to the central government&amp;rsquo;s statement to the Supreme Court last week, a third of the India&amp;rsquo;s districts are currently facing a severe drought. This means that at least 33 crore Indians are affected by ongoing the crisis.

Expressing their deep...&#039;
$disp = &#039;&lt;div align=&quot;justify&quot;&gt;-TheWire.in&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;em&gt;According to the central government&amp;rsquo;s statement to the Supreme Court last week, a third of the India&amp;rsquo;s districts are currently facing a severe drought. This means that at least 33 crore Indians are affected by ongoing the crisis.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Expressing their deep concern on the issue and the impact it is having on rural populations of the country, and asking that the government take appropriate relief measures immediately, more than 150 academics and activists have written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/em&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Dear Mr Prime Minister,&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;We wish to convey our deep collective anxiety about the enormous suffering of the rural poor in large parts of India&amp;rsquo;s countryside as they are battling drought, often for the second or even third consecutive year. In areas where rains have failed, farmers who depend mainly on rainwater to irrigate their crops have no or very low crop yields. Those who rely on irrigation are also affected, with groundwater sinking and streams and reservoirs drying up. All this adds to chronic agrarian distress reflected in a massive slowdown in agricultural growth during the last few years, with no imminent signs of recovery.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;The consequence of this adversity is massive distress movement of populations, causing broken childhoods, interrupted education, life in camps, city pavements or crowded shanties. Add to this the old and the infirm who are left behind, to beg for food or just quietly die. The cattle for whom there is no fodder, sold at distress prices or just abandoned to fend for themselves. And the drying up even of sources of water to drink.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;However, the response of central and state administrations to looming drought is sadly listless, lacking in both urgency and compassion. The scale of MGNREGA works is way below what is required and wages often remain unpaid for months. Even more gravely, the central and state governments are doing far too little to implement the National Food Security Act, three years after it came into force. Had the Act been in place, more than 80% of rural households in the poorer states would be able to secure about half of their monthly cereal requirements almost free of cost. In a drought situation food security entitlements should be made universal.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;In addition, we find no plans in most of the drought-hit regions for feeding the destitute, especially old persons left behind when families migrate, children without care-givers, the disabled and other vulnerable groups. ICDS centres could have been upgraded to supply emergency feeding to the destitute during the drought, but this has not happened. Under Supreme Court orders, school meals should be served on all days, including holidays, in drought-affected areas, but this is rarely the case. Arrangements to augment drinking water supply, including ensuring that marginalised hamlets have functioning tube-wells and transporting water where necessary, are awfully inadequate. There are also few attempts to create fodder banks and cattle camps. Most of these measures used to be a routine part of state response to drought, and were often undertaken with a great sense of urgency, but they are barely being considered today.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;The highest priority of the central government in a drought situation should be to ensure the creation of millions of additional person-days of work in all affected villages. Instead, the government has not even allocated enough funds this year to sustain the level of employment generated last year &amp;ndash; 233 crore person-days according to official data. At current levels of expenditure per person-day, this would cost well over 50,000 crore rupees. Yet the central government has allocated just 38,500 crore rupees to MGNREGA this year, of which more than 12,000 crore rupees are required to clear pending liabilities. These liabilities only prove the distress crores of workers have been put through because of wages left unpaid for months at a time. Unemployment allowance and mandatory compensation for delayed wage payments are also not paid, citing &amp;ldquo;insufficient funds&amp;rdquo;, resulting in a failure of the Act, and its legal safeguards. Most alarming today, is that instead of expanding, MGNREGA is all set to contract in this critical drought year, unless financial allocations are vastly expanded.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;The enormous distress &amp;ndash; of food, drinking water, work, fodder for animals, and dignity &amp;ndash; of hundred of millions is utterly unacceptable. We demand that the central government under your leadership acknowledges these failures and makes rapid amends, by implementing all the traditional relief measures as well as by ensuring full implementation of the National Food Security Act 2013 and the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act 2005 in letter and spirit.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Signed &amp;ndash;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aruna Roy, senior activist, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jean Dreze, Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jayati Ghosh, Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Harsh Mander, Activist, Writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Satish Deshpande, Academic, Sociologist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Deep Joshi, senior environmentalist and water activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prabhat Patnaik, Professor Emeritus, Economist, Senior academician&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amit Bhaduri, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vijay Vyas, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Utsa Patnaik, Professor and Senior Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Arundhati Roy, Writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Admiral Ramdas, former Chief of Naval Staff&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Lalita Ramdas, activist, Maharashtra&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Naseeruddin Shah, Actor&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Brinda Karat, Women&amp;rsquo;s leader, Politician&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Medha Patkar, Activist, politician, women&amp;rsquo;s leader&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shabana Azmi, Actor&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kavitha Kuruganti, Activist, leader of farmer&amp;rsquo;s groups&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nivedita Menon, Academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nandita Das, actor&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mukul Kesavan, writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Leela Samson, dancer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ashok Vajpeyi, writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Justice Rajinder Sachar, senior jurist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Syeda Hameed, women&amp;rsquo;s leader, former member Planning Commission&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shyam Benegal, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Himanshu Thakkar, environmentalist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Wajahat Habibullah, former Chief Information Commissioner&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Deepak Sandhu, former Chief Information Commissioner&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shailesh Gandhi, former Central Information Commissioner&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Uma Chakravarty, historian&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ritwick Dutta, environmental legal activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Trilochan Shastry, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jagdeep Chhokar, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Advocate Vrinda Grover&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nandini Sundar, Sociologist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shekhar Singh, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amar Kanwar, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prof C.P.Chandrasekhar, labour economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dilip Simeon, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prithvi Sharma, activist, also on behalf of ICAN&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Maja Daruwala, senior human rights activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mathew Cherian, Helpage&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; M. Krishna, Musician, Writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anand Patwardhan, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Lalit Mathur, former civil servant&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kavita Srivastava, PUCL, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anjali Bhardwaj, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Achin Vinayak, academic and activist, Delhi&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ram Rehman, photographer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Pamela Philipose, journalist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; A.Gandhi , academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rita Anand, senior journalist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nirmala Lakshman, senior journalist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Tripurari Sharma, Drama and Theater, playright&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Harsh Sethi, writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Madhu Bhaduri, former diplomat&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sharmila Tagore, Actor&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amitabh Mukhopadhyay, former auditor, CAG&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mridula Mukherjee, historian&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aditya Mukherjee, historian&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amita Baviskar, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Arundhati Dhuru, activist, UP&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kavita Krishnan, activist, leader of women&amp;rsquo;s groups&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Reetika Khera, Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sanjay Kak, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Baba Adhav, labour leader&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Achyut Das, activist, Odisha&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ajit Ranade, economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kalpana Kannabiran, sociologist, lawyer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vasanth Kannabiran, teacher and activist, Andhra&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Paul Divakar, dalit activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Abha Sur, writer, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rajni Bakshi, writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ravi Chopra, activist, Uttarakhand&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Neelabh Mishra, writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Poornima Chikarmane, Pune&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Zoya Hasan , academic, political scientist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shabnam Hashmi, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rebecca John, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anandalakshmy, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Smita Gupta, Economist, Head of economic cell, AIDWA&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Praveen Jha, Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Gautam Navlakha, senior activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Venkatesh Nayak, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Seema Mustafa, journalist, editor, The Citizen&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Bela Bhatia, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Bezwada Wilson, senior activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Haragopal, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sumit Chakravarty, Editor, Mainstream&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Gargi Chakravarty, Women&amp;rsquo;s activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Patricia Uberoi&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kamal Chenoy, senior academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Janaki Nair, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vipul Mudgal, journalist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Deepa Sinha, Right to Food activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Himanshu, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Uma Pillai, former civil servant&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nikhil Dey, activist, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; N.Rath, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Abey George,academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mahesh Pandya, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jyothi Krishnan, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Balram, activist, Jharkhand&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; AL Rangarajan, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rajaram Singh&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rameshwar Prasad, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anand Murugesan, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Abha Bhaiya, women&amp;rsquo;s activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sagar Rabari, activist, Gujarat&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dhirendhra Singh&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rammanohar Reddy, former editor EPW, senior writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nandini K Oza, water activist, Maharasthra&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Osama Manzar, Digital Empowerment Foundation&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rakesh Sharma&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Pankti Jog, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rakesh Reddy Dubbudu, RTI activist, Telangana&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Subrat Das, economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Umesh Anand, editor, Civil Society&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Charul,singer, cultural activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vinay, singer, writer, musician, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Maya Caroli&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ashwini Kulkarni, activist, Pune&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vibha Puri Das&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Surjit Das&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amrita Johri, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Madhuresh Kumar, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ankur Sarin&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dipak Dholakia&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Navdeep Mathur&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Harinesh, activist, Gujarat&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Persis Ginwalla&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shamsul Islam, theatre activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prafulla Samantara, activist, Odisha&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Lingraj Azad, activist, Odisha&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sunilam, activist, Madhya Pradesh&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aradhana Bhargava&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Meera Chaudhary, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Suniti SR, activist, Pune&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Suhas Kolhekar, activist Pune&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prasad Bagwe&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Gabrielle Dietrich, leader of Women&amp;rsquo;s groups&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Geetha Ramakrishnan, activist Tamil Nadu&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; R. Neelkandan&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; P Chennaiah, activist Telangana&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ramakrishnan Raju, activist, Andhra&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Richa Singh, activist, Uttar Pradesh&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sister Cella&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vimal Bhai, activist, Himachal Pradesh&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jabar Singh, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anand Mazgaonkar&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Krishnakanth&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kamayani Swami, activist, Bihar&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ashish Ranjan, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mahendra Yadav, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Faisal Khan, activist, Haryana&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; JS Walla&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kailash Meena, activist, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amitava Mitra&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aveek Saha&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; BS Rawat&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rajendra Ravi&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shabnam Shaikh&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mahesh Pandya&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; S. Shylendra&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Iqbalkhan Pulli&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Soumen Ray&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ramachandra Prasad, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ravi M.&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dipak Dholakia&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&#039;
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Cake\Http\Runner::run() - CORE/src/Http/Runner.php, line 51</pre></div></pre>latest-news-updates/activists-academics-write-open-letter-to-pm-modi-on-the-drought-4679222.html"/>
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According to the central government&rsquo;s statement to the Supreme Court last week, a third of the India&rsquo;s districts are currently facing a severe drought. This means that at least 33 crore Indians are affected by ongoing the crisis.

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                <strong>Activists, Academics Write Open Letter to PM Modi on the Drought</strong></h1>
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                <div align="justify">-TheWire.in<br /><br /><em>According to the central government&rsquo;s statement to the Supreme Court last week, a third of the India&rsquo;s districts are currently facing a severe drought. This means that at least 33 crore Indians are affected by ongoing the crisis.<br /><br />Expressing their deep concern on the issue and the impact it is having on rural populations of the country, and asking that the government take appropriate relief measures immediately, more than 150 academics and activists have written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi.<br /></em><br />Dear Mr Prime Minister,<br /><br />We wish to convey our deep collective anxiety about the enormous suffering of the rural poor in large parts of India&rsquo;s countryside as they are battling drought, often for the second or even third consecutive year. In areas where rains have failed, farmers who depend mainly on rainwater to irrigate their crops have no or very low crop yields. Those who rely on irrigation are also affected, with groundwater sinking and streams and reservoirs drying up. All this adds to chronic agrarian distress reflected in a massive slowdown in agricultural growth during the last few years, with no imminent signs of recovery.<br /><br />The consequence of this adversity is massive distress movement of populations, causing broken childhoods, interrupted education, life in camps, city pavements or crowded shanties. Add to this the old and the infirm who are left behind, to beg for food or just quietly die. The cattle for whom there is no fodder, sold at distress prices or just abandoned to fend for themselves. And the drying up even of sources of water to drink.<br /><br />However, the response of central and state administrations to looming drought is sadly listless, lacking in both urgency and compassion. The scale of MGNREGA works is way below what is required and wages often remain unpaid for months. Even more gravely, the central and state governments are doing far too little to implement the National Food Security Act, three years after it came into force. Had the Act been in place, more than 80% of rural households in the poorer states would be able to secure about half of their monthly cereal requirements almost free of cost. In a drought situation food security entitlements should be made universal.<br /><br />In addition, we find no plans in most of the drought-hit regions for feeding the destitute, especially old persons left behind when families migrate, children without care-givers, the disabled and other vulnerable groups. ICDS centres could have been upgraded to supply emergency feeding to the destitute during the drought, but this has not happened. Under Supreme Court orders, school meals should be served on all days, including holidays, in drought-affected areas, but this is rarely the case. Arrangements to augment drinking water supply, including ensuring that marginalised hamlets have functioning tube-wells and transporting water where necessary, are awfully inadequate. There are also few attempts to create fodder banks and cattle camps. Most of these measures used to be a routine part of state response to drought, and were often undertaken with a great sense of urgency, but they are barely being considered today.<br /><br />The highest priority of the central government in a drought situation should be to ensure the creation of millions of additional person-days of work in all affected villages. Instead, the government has not even allocated enough funds this year to sustain the level of employment generated last year &ndash; 233 crore person-days according to official data. At current levels of expenditure per person-day, this would cost well over 50,000 crore rupees. Yet the central government has allocated just 38,500 crore rupees to MGNREGA this year, of which more than 12,000 crore rupees are required to clear pending liabilities. These liabilities only prove the distress crores of workers have been put through because of wages left unpaid for months at a time. Unemployment allowance and mandatory compensation for delayed wage payments are also not paid, citing &ldquo;insufficient funds&rdquo;, resulting in a failure of the Act, and its legal safeguards. Most alarming today, is that instead of expanding, MGNREGA is all set to contract in this critical drought year, unless financial allocations are vastly expanded.<br /><br />The enormous distress &ndash; of food, drinking water, work, fodder for animals, and dignity &ndash; of hundred of millions is utterly unacceptable. We demand that the central government under your leadership acknowledges these failures and makes rapid amends, by implementing all the traditional relief measures as well as by ensuring full implementation of the National Food Security Act 2013 and the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act 2005 in letter and spirit.<br /><br />Signed &ndash;<br /><br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Aruna Roy, senior activist, Rajasthan<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Jean Dreze, Economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Jayati Ghosh, Economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Harsh Mander, Activist, Writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Satish Deshpande, Academic, Sociologist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Deep Joshi, senior environmentalist and water activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Prabhat Patnaik, Professor Emeritus, Economist, Senior academician<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amit Bhaduri, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vijay Vyas, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Utsa Patnaik, Professor and Senior Economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Arundhati Roy, Writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Admiral Ramdas, former Chief of Naval Staff<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Lalita Ramdas, activist, Maharashtra<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Naseeruddin Shah, Actor<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Brinda Karat, Women&rsquo;s leader, Politician<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Medha Patkar, Activist, politician, women&rsquo;s leader<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shabana Azmi, Actor<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kavitha Kuruganti, Activist, leader of farmer&rsquo;s groups<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nivedita Menon, Academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nandita Das, actor<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mukul Kesavan, writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Leela Samson, dancer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ashok Vajpeyi, writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Justice Rajinder Sachar, senior jurist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Syeda Hameed, women&rsquo;s leader, former member Planning Commission<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shyam Benegal, filmmaker<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Himanshu Thakkar, environmentalist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Wajahat Habibullah, former Chief Information Commissioner<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Deepak Sandhu, former Chief Information Commissioner<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shailesh Gandhi, former Central Information Commissioner<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Uma Chakravarty, historian<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ritwick Dutta, environmental legal activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Trilochan Shastry, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Jagdeep Chhokar, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Advocate Vrinda Grover<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nandini Sundar, Sociologist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shekhar Singh, RTI activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amar Kanwar, filmmaker<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Prof C.P.Chandrasekhar, labour economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Dilip Simeon, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Prithvi Sharma, activist, also on behalf of ICAN<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Maja Daruwala, senior human rights activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mathew Cherian, Helpage<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; M. Krishna, Musician, Writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Anand Patwardhan, filmmaker<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Lalit Mathur, former civil servant<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kavita Srivastava, PUCL, Rajasthan<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Anjali Bhardwaj, RTI activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Achin Vinayak, academic and activist, Delhi<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ram Rehman, photographer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Pamela Philipose, journalist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; A.Gandhi , academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rita Anand, senior journalist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nirmala Lakshman, senior journalist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Tripurari Sharma, Drama and Theater, playright<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Harsh Sethi, writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Madhu Bhaduri, former diplomat<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sharmila Tagore, Actor<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amitabh Mukhopadhyay, former auditor, CAG<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mridula Mukherjee, historian<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Aditya Mukherjee, historian<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amita Baviskar, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Arundhati Dhuru, activist, UP<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kavita Krishnan, activist, leader of women&rsquo;s groups<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Reetika Khera, Economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sanjay Kak, filmmaker<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Baba Adhav, labour leader<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Achyut Das, activist, Odisha<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ajit Ranade, economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kalpana Kannabiran, sociologist, lawyer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vasanth Kannabiran, teacher and activist, Andhra<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Paul Divakar, dalit activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Abha Sur, writer, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rajni Bakshi, writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ravi Chopra, activist, Uttarakhand<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Neelabh Mishra, writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Poornima Chikarmane, Pune<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Zoya Hasan , academic, political scientist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shabnam Hashmi, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rebecca John, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Anandalakshmy, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Smita Gupta, Economist, Head of economic cell, AIDWA<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Praveen Jha, Economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Gautam Navlakha, senior activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Venkatesh Nayak, RTI activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Seema Mustafa, journalist, editor, The Citizen<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Bela Bhatia, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Bezwada Wilson, senior activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Haragopal, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sumit Chakravarty, Editor, Mainstream<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Gargi Chakravarty, Women&rsquo;s activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Patricia Uberoi<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kamal Chenoy, senior academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Janaki Nair, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vipul Mudgal, journalist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Deepa Sinha, Right to Food activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Himanshu, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Uma Pillai, former civil servant<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nikhil Dey, activist, Rajasthan<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; N.Rath, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Abey George,academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mahesh Pandya, ICAN<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Jyothi Krishnan, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Balram, activist, Jharkhand<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; AL Rangarajan, ICAN<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rajaram Singh<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rameshwar Prasad, ICAN<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Anand Murugesan, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Abha Bhaiya, women&rsquo;s activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sagar Rabari, activist, Gujarat<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Dhirendhra Singh<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rammanohar Reddy, former editor EPW, senior writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nandini K Oza, water activist, Maharasthra<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Osama Manzar, Digital Empowerment Foundation<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rakesh Sharma<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Pankti Jog, RTI activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rakesh Reddy Dubbudu, RTI activist, Telangana<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Subrat Das, economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Umesh Anand, editor, Civil Society<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Charul,singer, cultural activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vinay, singer, writer, musician, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Maya Caroli<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ashwini Kulkarni, activist, Pune<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vibha Puri Das<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Surjit Das<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amrita Johri, RTI activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Madhuresh Kumar, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ankur Sarin<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Dipak Dholakia<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Navdeep Mathur<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Harinesh, activist, Gujarat<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Persis Ginwalla<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shamsul Islam, theatre activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Prafulla Samantara, activist, Odisha<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Lingraj Azad, activist, Odisha<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sunilam, activist, Madhya Pradesh<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Aradhana Bhargava<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Meera Chaudhary, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Suniti SR, activist, Pune<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Suhas Kolhekar, activist Pune<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Prasad Bagwe<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Gabrielle Dietrich, leader of Women&rsquo;s groups<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Geetha Ramakrishnan, activist Tamil Nadu<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; R. Neelkandan<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; P Chennaiah, activist Telangana<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ramakrishnan Raju, activist, Andhra<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Richa Singh, activist, Uttar Pradesh<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sister Cella<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vimal Bhai, activist, Himachal Pradesh<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Jabar Singh, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Anand Mazgaonkar<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Krishnakanth<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kamayani Swami, activist, Bihar<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ashish Ranjan, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mahendra Yadav, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Faisal Khan, activist, Haryana<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; JS Walla<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kailash Meena, activist, Rajasthan<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amitava Mitra<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Aveek Saha<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; BS Rawat<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rajendra Ravi<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shabnam Shaikh<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mahesh Pandya<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; S. Shylendra<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Iqbalkhan Pulli<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Soumen Ray<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ramachandra Prasad, ICAN<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ravi M.<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Dipak Dholakia<br /><br /></div>               </font>
        </td>
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        <td>&nbsp;</td>
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    <link rel="canonical" href="https://im4change.in/<pre class="cake-error"><a href="javascript:void(0);" onclick="document.getElementById('cakeErr67f060f2f27cd-trace').style.display = (document.getElementById('cakeErr67f060f2f27cd-trace').style.display == 'none' ? '' : 'none');"><b>Notice</b> (8)</a>: Undefined variable: urlPrefix [<b>APP/Template/Layout/printlayout.ctp</b>, line <b>8</b>]<div id="cakeErr67f060f2f27cd-trace" class="cake-stack-trace" style="display: none;"><a href="javascript:void(0);" onclick="document.getElementById('cakeErr67f060f2f27cd-code').style.display = (document.getElementById('cakeErr67f060f2f27cd-code').style.display == 'none' ? '' : 'none')">Code</a> <a href="javascript:void(0);" onclick="document.getElementById('cakeErr67f060f2f27cd-context').style.display = (document.getElementById('cakeErr67f060f2f27cd-context').style.display == 'none' ? '' : 'none')">Context</a><pre id="cakeErr67f060f2f27cd-code" class="cake-code-dump" style="display: none;"><code><span style="color: #000000"><span style="color: #0000BB"></span><span style="color: #007700">&lt;</span><span style="color: #0000BB">head</span><span style="color: #007700">&gt;
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		&#039;id&#039; =&gt; (int) 31154,
		&#039;title&#039; =&gt; &#039;Activists, Academics Write Open Letter to PM Modi on the Drought&#039;,
		&#039;subheading&#039; =&gt; &#039;&#039;,
		&#039;description&#039; =&gt; &#039;&lt;div align=&quot;justify&quot;&gt;
-TheWire.in&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;em&gt;According to the central government&amp;rsquo;s statement to the Supreme Court last week, a third of the India&amp;rsquo;s districts are currently facing a severe drought. This means that at least 33 crore Indians are affected by ongoing the crisis.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
Expressing their deep concern on the issue and the impact it is having on rural populations of the country, and asking that the government take appropriate relief measures immediately, more than 150 academics and activists have written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;/em&gt;&lt;br /&gt;
Dear Mr Prime Minister,&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
We wish to convey our deep collective anxiety about the enormous suffering of the rural poor in large parts of India&amp;rsquo;s countryside as they are battling drought, often for the second or even third consecutive year. In areas where rains have failed, farmers who depend mainly on rainwater to irrigate their crops have no or very low crop yields. Those who rely on irrigation are also affected, with groundwater sinking and streams and reservoirs drying up. All this adds to chronic agrarian distress reflected in a massive slowdown in agricultural growth during the last few years, with no imminent signs of recovery.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
The consequence of this adversity is massive distress movement of populations, causing broken childhoods, interrupted education, life in camps, city pavements or crowded shanties. Add to this the old and the infirm who are left behind, to beg for food or just quietly die. The cattle for whom there is no fodder, sold at distress prices or just abandoned to fend for themselves. And the drying up even of sources of water to drink.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
However, the response of central and state administrations to looming drought is sadly listless, lacking in both urgency and compassion. The scale of MGNREGA works is way below what is required and wages often remain unpaid for months. Even more gravely, the central and state governments are doing far too little to implement the National Food Security Act, three years after it came into force. Had the Act been in place, more than 80% of rural households in the poorer states would be able to secure about half of their monthly cereal requirements almost free of cost. In a drought situation food security entitlements should be made universal.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
In addition, we find no plans in most of the drought-hit regions for feeding the destitute, especially old persons left behind when families migrate, children without care-givers, the disabled and other vulnerable groups. ICDS centres could have been upgraded to supply emergency feeding to the destitute during the drought, but this has not happened. Under Supreme Court orders, school meals should be served on all days, including holidays, in drought-affected areas, but this is rarely the case. Arrangements to augment drinking water supply, including ensuring that marginalised hamlets have functioning tube-wells and transporting water where necessary, are awfully inadequate. There are also few attempts to create fodder banks and cattle camps. Most of these measures used to be a routine part of state response to drought, and were often undertaken with a great sense of urgency, but they are barely being considered today.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
The highest priority of the central government in a drought situation should be to ensure the creation of millions of additional person-days of work in all affected villages. Instead, the government has not even allocated enough funds this year to sustain the level of employment generated last year &amp;ndash; 233 crore person-days according to official data. At current levels of expenditure per person-day, this would cost well over 50,000 crore rupees. Yet the central government has allocated just 38,500 crore rupees to MGNREGA this year, of which more than 12,000 crore rupees are required to clear pending liabilities. These liabilities only prove the distress crores of workers have been put through because of wages left unpaid for months at a time. Unemployment allowance and mandatory compensation for delayed wage payments are also not paid, citing &amp;ldquo;insufficient funds&amp;rdquo;, resulting in a failure of the Act, and its legal safeguards. Most alarming today, is that instead of expanding, MGNREGA is all set to contract in this critical drought year, unless financial allocations are vastly expanded.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
The enormous distress &amp;ndash; of food, drinking water, work, fodder for animals, and dignity &amp;ndash; of hundred of millions is utterly unacceptable. We demand that the central government under your leadership acknowledges these failures and makes rapid amends, by implementing all the traditional relief measures as well as by ensuring full implementation of the National Food Security Act 2013 and the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act 2005 in letter and spirit.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
Signed &amp;ndash;&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aruna Roy, senior activist, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jean Dreze, Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jayati Ghosh, Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Harsh Mander, Activist, Writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Satish Deshpande, Academic, Sociologist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Deep Joshi, senior environmentalist and water activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prabhat Patnaik, Professor Emeritus, Economist, Senior academician&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amit Bhaduri, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vijay Vyas, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Utsa Patnaik, Professor and Senior Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Arundhati Roy, Writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Admiral Ramdas, former Chief of Naval Staff&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Lalita Ramdas, activist, Maharashtra&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Naseeruddin Shah, Actor&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Brinda Karat, Women&amp;rsquo;s leader, Politician&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Medha Patkar, Activist, politician, women&amp;rsquo;s leader&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shabana Azmi, Actor&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kavitha Kuruganti, Activist, leader of farmer&amp;rsquo;s groups&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nivedita Menon, Academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nandita Das, actor&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mukul Kesavan, writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Leela Samson, dancer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ashok Vajpeyi, writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Justice Rajinder Sachar, senior jurist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Syeda Hameed, women&amp;rsquo;s leader, former member Planning Commission&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shyam Benegal, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Himanshu Thakkar, environmentalist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Wajahat Habibullah, former Chief Information Commissioner&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Deepak Sandhu, former Chief Information Commissioner&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shailesh Gandhi, former Central Information Commissioner&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Uma Chakravarty, historian&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ritwick Dutta, environmental legal activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Trilochan Shastry, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jagdeep Chhokar, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Advocate Vrinda Grover&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nandini Sundar, Sociologist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shekhar Singh, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amar Kanwar, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prof C.P.Chandrasekhar, labour economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dilip Simeon, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prithvi Sharma, activist, also on behalf of ICAN&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Maja Daruwala, senior human rights activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mathew Cherian, Helpage&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; M. Krishna, Musician, Writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anand Patwardhan, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Lalit Mathur, former civil servant&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kavita Srivastava, PUCL, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anjali Bhardwaj, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Achin Vinayak, academic and activist, Delhi&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ram Rehman, photographer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Pamela Philipose, journalist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; A.Gandhi , academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rita Anand, senior journalist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nirmala Lakshman, senior journalist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Tripurari Sharma, Drama and Theater, playright&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Harsh Sethi, writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Madhu Bhaduri, former diplomat&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sharmila Tagore, Actor&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amitabh Mukhopadhyay, former auditor, CAG&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mridula Mukherjee, historian&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aditya Mukherjee, historian&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amita Baviskar, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Arundhati Dhuru, activist, UP&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kavita Krishnan, activist, leader of women&amp;rsquo;s groups&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Reetika Khera, Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sanjay Kak, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Baba Adhav, labour leader&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Achyut Das, activist, Odisha&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ajit Ranade, economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kalpana Kannabiran, sociologist, lawyer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vasanth Kannabiran, teacher and activist, Andhra&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Paul Divakar, dalit activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Abha Sur, writer, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rajni Bakshi, writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ravi Chopra, activist, Uttarakhand&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Neelabh Mishra, writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Poornima Chikarmane, Pune&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Zoya Hasan , academic, political scientist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shabnam Hashmi, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rebecca John, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anandalakshmy, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Smita Gupta, Economist, Head of economic cell, AIDWA&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Praveen Jha, Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Gautam Navlakha, senior activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Venkatesh Nayak, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Seema Mustafa, journalist, editor, The Citizen&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Bela Bhatia, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Bezwada Wilson, senior activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Haragopal, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sumit Chakravarty, Editor, Mainstream&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Gargi Chakravarty, Women&amp;rsquo;s activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Patricia Uberoi&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kamal Chenoy, senior academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Janaki Nair, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vipul Mudgal, journalist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Deepa Sinha, Right to Food activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Himanshu, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Uma Pillai, former civil servant&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nikhil Dey, activist, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; N.Rath, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Abey George,academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mahesh Pandya, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jyothi Krishnan, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Balram, activist, Jharkhand&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; AL Rangarajan, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rajaram Singh&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rameshwar Prasad, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anand Murugesan, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Abha Bhaiya, women&amp;rsquo;s activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sagar Rabari, activist, Gujarat&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dhirendhra Singh&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rammanohar Reddy, former editor EPW, senior writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nandini K Oza, water activist, Maharasthra&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Osama Manzar, Digital Empowerment Foundation&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rakesh Sharma&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Pankti Jog, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rakesh Reddy Dubbudu, RTI activist, Telangana&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Subrat Das, economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Umesh Anand, editor, Civil Society&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Charul,singer, cultural activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vinay, singer, writer, musician, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Maya Caroli&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ashwini Kulkarni, activist, Pune&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vibha Puri Das&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Surjit Das&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amrita Johri, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Madhuresh Kumar, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ankur Sarin&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dipak Dholakia&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Navdeep Mathur&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Harinesh, activist, Gujarat&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Persis Ginwalla&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shamsul Islam, theatre activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prafulla Samantara, activist, Odisha&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Lingraj Azad, activist, Odisha&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sunilam, activist, Madhya Pradesh&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aradhana Bhargava&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Meera Chaudhary, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Suniti SR, activist, Pune&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Suhas Kolhekar, activist Pune&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prasad Bagwe&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Gabrielle Dietrich, leader of Women&amp;rsquo;s groups&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Geetha Ramakrishnan, activist Tamil Nadu&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; R. Neelkandan&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; P Chennaiah, activist Telangana&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ramakrishnan Raju, activist, Andhra&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Richa Singh, activist, Uttar Pradesh&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sister Cella&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vimal Bhai, activist, Himachal Pradesh&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jabar Singh, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anand Mazgaonkar&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Krishnakanth&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kamayani Swami, activist, Bihar&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ashish Ranjan, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mahendra Yadav, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Faisal Khan, activist, Haryana&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; JS Walla&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kailash Meena, activist, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amitava Mitra&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aveek Saha&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; BS Rawat&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rajendra Ravi&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shabnam Shaikh&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mahesh Pandya&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; S. Shylendra&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Iqbalkhan Pulli&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Soumen Ray&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ramachandra Prasad, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ravi M.&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dipak Dholakia&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
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-TheWire.in

According to the central government&amp;rsquo;s statement to the Supreme Court last week, a third of the India&amp;rsquo;s districts are currently facing a severe drought. This means that at least 33 crore Indians are affected by ongoing the crisis.

Expressing their deep...&#039;,
	&#039;disp&#039; =&gt; &#039;&lt;div align=&quot;justify&quot;&gt;-TheWire.in&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;em&gt;According to the central government&amp;rsquo;s statement to the Supreme Court last week, a third of the India&amp;rsquo;s districts are currently facing a severe drought. This means that at least 33 crore Indians are affected by ongoing the crisis.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Expressing their deep concern on the issue and the impact it is having on rural populations of the country, and asking that the government take appropriate relief measures immediately, more than 150 academics and activists have written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/em&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Dear Mr Prime Minister,&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;We wish to convey our deep collective anxiety about the enormous suffering of the rural poor in large parts of India&amp;rsquo;s countryside as they are battling drought, often for the second or even third consecutive year. In areas where rains have failed, farmers who depend mainly on rainwater to irrigate their crops have no or very low crop yields. Those who rely on irrigation are also affected, with groundwater sinking and streams and reservoirs drying up. All this adds to chronic agrarian distress reflected in a massive slowdown in agricultural growth during the last few years, with no imminent signs of recovery.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;The consequence of this adversity is massive distress movement of populations, causing broken childhoods, interrupted education, life in camps, city pavements or crowded shanties. Add to this the old and the infirm who are left behind, to beg for food or just quietly die. The cattle for whom there is no fodder, sold at distress prices or just abandoned to fend for themselves. And the drying up even of sources of water to drink.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;However, the response of central and state administrations to looming drought is sadly listless, lacking in both urgency and compassion. The scale of MGNREGA works is way below what is required and wages often remain unpaid for months. Even more gravely, the central and state governments are doing far too little to implement the National Food Security Act, three years after it came into force. Had the Act been in place, more than 80% of rural households in the poorer states would be able to secure about half of their monthly cereal requirements almost free of cost. In a drought situation food security entitlements should be made universal.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;In addition, we find no plans in most of the drought-hit regions for feeding the destitute, especially old persons left behind when families migrate, children without care-givers, the disabled and other vulnerable groups. ICDS centres could have been upgraded to supply emergency feeding to the destitute during the drought, but this has not happened. Under Supreme Court orders, school meals should be served on all days, including holidays, in drought-affected areas, but this is rarely the case. Arrangements to augment drinking water supply, including ensuring that marginalised hamlets have functioning tube-wells and transporting water where necessary, are awfully inadequate. There are also few attempts to create fodder banks and cattle camps. Most of these measures used to be a routine part of state response to drought, and were often undertaken with a great sense of urgency, but they are barely being considered today.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;The highest priority of the central government in a drought situation should be to ensure the creation of millions of additional person-days of work in all affected villages. Instead, the government has not even allocated enough funds this year to sustain the level of employment generated last year &amp;ndash; 233 crore person-days according to official data. At current levels of expenditure per person-day, this would cost well over 50,000 crore rupees. Yet the central government has allocated just 38,500 crore rupees to MGNREGA this year, of which more than 12,000 crore rupees are required to clear pending liabilities. These liabilities only prove the distress crores of workers have been put through because of wages left unpaid for months at a time. Unemployment allowance and mandatory compensation for delayed wage payments are also not paid, citing &amp;ldquo;insufficient funds&amp;rdquo;, resulting in a failure of the Act, and its legal safeguards. Most alarming today, is that instead of expanding, MGNREGA is all set to contract in this critical drought year, unless financial allocations are vastly expanded.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;The enormous distress &amp;ndash; of food, drinking water, work, fodder for animals, and dignity &amp;ndash; of hundred of millions is utterly unacceptable. We demand that the central government under your leadership acknowledges these failures and makes rapid amends, by implementing all the traditional relief measures as well as by ensuring full implementation of the National Food Security Act 2013 and the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act 2005 in letter and spirit.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Signed &amp;ndash;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aruna Roy, senior activist, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jean Dreze, Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jayati Ghosh, Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Harsh Mander, Activist, Writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Satish Deshpande, Academic, Sociologist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Deep Joshi, senior environmentalist and water activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prabhat Patnaik, Professor Emeritus, Economist, Senior academician&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amit Bhaduri, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vijay Vyas, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Utsa Patnaik, Professor and Senior Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Arundhati Roy, Writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Admiral Ramdas, former Chief of Naval Staff&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Lalita Ramdas, activist, Maharashtra&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Naseeruddin Shah, Actor&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Brinda Karat, Women&amp;rsquo;s leader, Politician&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Medha Patkar, Activist, politician, women&amp;rsquo;s leader&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shabana Azmi, Actor&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kavitha Kuruganti, Activist, leader of farmer&amp;rsquo;s groups&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nivedita Menon, Academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nandita Das, actor&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mukul Kesavan, writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Leela Samson, dancer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ashok Vajpeyi, writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Justice Rajinder Sachar, senior jurist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Syeda Hameed, women&amp;rsquo;s leader, former member Planning Commission&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shyam Benegal, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Himanshu Thakkar, environmentalist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Wajahat Habibullah, former Chief Information Commissioner&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Deepak Sandhu, former Chief Information Commissioner&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shailesh Gandhi, former Central Information Commissioner&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Uma Chakravarty, historian&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ritwick Dutta, environmental legal activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Trilochan Shastry, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jagdeep Chhokar, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Advocate Vrinda Grover&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nandini Sundar, Sociologist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shekhar Singh, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amar Kanwar, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prof C.P.Chandrasekhar, labour economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dilip Simeon, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prithvi Sharma, activist, also on behalf of ICAN&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Maja Daruwala, senior human rights activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mathew Cherian, Helpage&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; M. Krishna, Musician, Writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anand Patwardhan, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Lalit Mathur, former civil servant&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kavita Srivastava, PUCL, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anjali Bhardwaj, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Achin Vinayak, academic and activist, Delhi&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ram Rehman, photographer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Pamela Philipose, journalist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; A.Gandhi , academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rita Anand, senior journalist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nirmala Lakshman, senior journalist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Tripurari Sharma, Drama and Theater, playright&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Harsh Sethi, writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Madhu Bhaduri, former diplomat&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sharmila Tagore, Actor&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amitabh Mukhopadhyay, former auditor, CAG&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mridula Mukherjee, historian&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aditya Mukherjee, historian&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amita Baviskar, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Arundhati Dhuru, activist, UP&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kavita Krishnan, activist, leader of women&amp;rsquo;s groups&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Reetika Khera, Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sanjay Kak, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Baba Adhav, labour leader&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Achyut Das, activist, Odisha&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ajit Ranade, economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kalpana Kannabiran, sociologist, lawyer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vasanth Kannabiran, teacher and activist, Andhra&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Paul Divakar, dalit activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Abha Sur, writer, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rajni Bakshi, writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ravi Chopra, activist, Uttarakhand&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Neelabh Mishra, writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Poornima Chikarmane, Pune&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Zoya Hasan , academic, political scientist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shabnam Hashmi, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rebecca John, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anandalakshmy, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Smita Gupta, Economist, Head of economic cell, AIDWA&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Praveen Jha, Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Gautam Navlakha, senior activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Venkatesh Nayak, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Seema Mustafa, journalist, editor, The Citizen&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Bela Bhatia, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Bezwada Wilson, senior activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Haragopal, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sumit Chakravarty, Editor, Mainstream&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Gargi Chakravarty, Women&amp;rsquo;s activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Patricia Uberoi&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kamal Chenoy, senior academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Janaki Nair, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vipul Mudgal, journalist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Deepa Sinha, Right to Food activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Himanshu, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Uma Pillai, former civil servant&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nikhil Dey, activist, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; N.Rath, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Abey George,academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mahesh Pandya, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jyothi Krishnan, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Balram, activist, Jharkhand&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; AL Rangarajan, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rajaram Singh&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rameshwar Prasad, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anand Murugesan, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Abha Bhaiya, women&amp;rsquo;s activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sagar Rabari, activist, Gujarat&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dhirendhra Singh&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rammanohar Reddy, former editor EPW, senior writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nandini K Oza, water activist, Maharasthra&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Osama Manzar, Digital Empowerment Foundation&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rakesh Sharma&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Pankti Jog, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rakesh Reddy Dubbudu, RTI activist, Telangana&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Subrat Das, economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Umesh Anand, editor, Civil Society&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Charul,singer, cultural activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vinay, singer, writer, musician, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Maya Caroli&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ashwini Kulkarni, activist, Pune&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vibha Puri Das&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Surjit Das&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amrita Johri, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Madhuresh Kumar, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ankur Sarin&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dipak Dholakia&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Navdeep Mathur&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Harinesh, activist, Gujarat&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Persis Ginwalla&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shamsul Islam, theatre activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prafulla Samantara, activist, Odisha&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Lingraj Azad, activist, Odisha&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sunilam, activist, Madhya Pradesh&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aradhana Bhargava&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Meera Chaudhary, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Suniti SR, activist, Pune&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Suhas Kolhekar, activist Pune&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prasad Bagwe&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Gabrielle Dietrich, leader of Women&amp;rsquo;s groups&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Geetha Ramakrishnan, activist Tamil Nadu&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; R. Neelkandan&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; P Chennaiah, activist Telangana&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ramakrishnan Raju, activist, Andhra&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Richa Singh, activist, Uttar Pradesh&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sister Cella&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vimal Bhai, activist, Himachal Pradesh&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jabar Singh, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anand Mazgaonkar&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Krishnakanth&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kamayani Swami, activist, Bihar&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ashish Ranjan, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mahendra Yadav, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Faisal Khan, activist, Haryana&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; JS Walla&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kailash Meena, activist, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amitava Mitra&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aveek Saha&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; BS Rawat&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rajendra Ravi&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shabnam Shaikh&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mahesh Pandya&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; S. Shylendra&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Iqbalkhan Pulli&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Soumen Ray&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ramachandra Prasad, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ravi M.&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dipak Dholakia&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&#039;,
	&#039;lang&#039; =&gt; &#039;English&#039;,
	&#039;SITE_URL&#039; =&gt; &#039;https://im4change.in/&#039;,
	&#039;site_title&#039; =&gt; &#039;im4change&#039;,
	&#039;adminprix&#039; =&gt; &#039;admin&#039;
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$article_current = object(App\Model\Entity\Article) {

	&#039;id&#039; =&gt; (int) 31154,
	&#039;title&#039; =&gt; &#039;Activists, Academics Write Open Letter to PM Modi on the Drought&#039;,
	&#039;subheading&#039; =&gt; &#039;&#039;,
	&#039;description&#039; =&gt; &#039;&lt;div align=&quot;justify&quot;&gt;
-TheWire.in&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;em&gt;According to the central government&amp;rsquo;s statement to the Supreme Court last week, a third of the India&amp;rsquo;s districts are currently facing a severe drought. This means that at least 33 crore Indians are affected by ongoing the crisis.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
Expressing their deep concern on the issue and the impact it is having on rural populations of the country, and asking that the government take appropriate relief measures immediately, more than 150 academics and activists have written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;/em&gt;&lt;br /&gt;
Dear Mr Prime Minister,&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
We wish to convey our deep collective anxiety about the enormous suffering of the rural poor in large parts of India&amp;rsquo;s countryside as they are battling drought, often for the second or even third consecutive year. In areas where rains have failed, farmers who depend mainly on rainwater to irrigate their crops have no or very low crop yields. Those who rely on irrigation are also affected, with groundwater sinking and streams and reservoirs drying up. All this adds to chronic agrarian distress reflected in a massive slowdown in agricultural growth during the last few years, with no imminent signs of recovery.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
The consequence of this adversity is massive distress movement of populations, causing broken childhoods, interrupted education, life in camps, city pavements or crowded shanties. Add to this the old and the infirm who are left behind, to beg for food or just quietly die. The cattle for whom there is no fodder, sold at distress prices or just abandoned to fend for themselves. And the drying up even of sources of water to drink.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
However, the response of central and state administrations to looming drought is sadly listless, lacking in both urgency and compassion. The scale of MGNREGA works is way below what is required and wages often remain unpaid for months. Even more gravely, the central and state governments are doing far too little to implement the National Food Security Act, three years after it came into force. Had the Act been in place, more than 80% of rural households in the poorer states would be able to secure about half of their monthly cereal requirements almost free of cost. In a drought situation food security entitlements should be made universal.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
In addition, we find no plans in most of the drought-hit regions for feeding the destitute, especially old persons left behind when families migrate, children without care-givers, the disabled and other vulnerable groups. ICDS centres could have been upgraded to supply emergency feeding to the destitute during the drought, but this has not happened. Under Supreme Court orders, school meals should be served on all days, including holidays, in drought-affected areas, but this is rarely the case. Arrangements to augment drinking water supply, including ensuring that marginalised hamlets have functioning tube-wells and transporting water where necessary, are awfully inadequate. There are also few attempts to create fodder banks and cattle camps. Most of these measures used to be a routine part of state response to drought, and were often undertaken with a great sense of urgency, but they are barely being considered today.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
The highest priority of the central government in a drought situation should be to ensure the creation of millions of additional person-days of work in all affected villages. Instead, the government has not even allocated enough funds this year to sustain the level of employment generated last year &amp;ndash; 233 crore person-days according to official data. At current levels of expenditure per person-day, this would cost well over 50,000 crore rupees. Yet the central government has allocated just 38,500 crore rupees to MGNREGA this year, of which more than 12,000 crore rupees are required to clear pending liabilities. These liabilities only prove the distress crores of workers have been put through because of wages left unpaid for months at a time. Unemployment allowance and mandatory compensation for delayed wage payments are also not paid, citing &amp;ldquo;insufficient funds&amp;rdquo;, resulting in a failure of the Act, and its legal safeguards. Most alarming today, is that instead of expanding, MGNREGA is all set to contract in this critical drought year, unless financial allocations are vastly expanded.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
The enormous distress &amp;ndash; of food, drinking water, work, fodder for animals, and dignity &amp;ndash; of hundred of millions is utterly unacceptable. We demand that the central government under your leadership acknowledges these failures and makes rapid amends, by implementing all the traditional relief measures as well as by ensuring full implementation of the National Food Security Act 2013 and the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act 2005 in letter and spirit.&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
Signed &amp;ndash;&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aruna Roy, senior activist, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jean Dreze, Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jayati Ghosh, Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Harsh Mander, Activist, Writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Satish Deshpande, Academic, Sociologist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Deep Joshi, senior environmentalist and water activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prabhat Patnaik, Professor Emeritus, Economist, Senior academician&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amit Bhaduri, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vijay Vyas, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Utsa Patnaik, Professor and Senior Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Arundhati Roy, Writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Admiral Ramdas, former Chief of Naval Staff&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Lalita Ramdas, activist, Maharashtra&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Naseeruddin Shah, Actor&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Brinda Karat, Women&amp;rsquo;s leader, Politician&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Medha Patkar, Activist, politician, women&amp;rsquo;s leader&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shabana Azmi, Actor&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kavitha Kuruganti, Activist, leader of farmer&amp;rsquo;s groups&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nivedita Menon, Academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nandita Das, actor&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mukul Kesavan, writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Leela Samson, dancer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ashok Vajpeyi, writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Justice Rajinder Sachar, senior jurist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Syeda Hameed, women&amp;rsquo;s leader, former member Planning Commission&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shyam Benegal, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Himanshu Thakkar, environmentalist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Wajahat Habibullah, former Chief Information Commissioner&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Deepak Sandhu, former Chief Information Commissioner&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shailesh Gandhi, former Central Information Commissioner&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Uma Chakravarty, historian&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ritwick Dutta, environmental legal activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Trilochan Shastry, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jagdeep Chhokar, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Advocate Vrinda Grover&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nandini Sundar, Sociologist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shekhar Singh, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amar Kanwar, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prof C.P.Chandrasekhar, labour economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dilip Simeon, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prithvi Sharma, activist, also on behalf of ICAN&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Maja Daruwala, senior human rights activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mathew Cherian, Helpage&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; M. Krishna, Musician, Writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anand Patwardhan, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Lalit Mathur, former civil servant&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kavita Srivastava, PUCL, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anjali Bhardwaj, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Achin Vinayak, academic and activist, Delhi&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ram Rehman, photographer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Pamela Philipose, journalist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; A.Gandhi , academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rita Anand, senior journalist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nirmala Lakshman, senior journalist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Tripurari Sharma, Drama and Theater, playright&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Harsh Sethi, writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Madhu Bhaduri, former diplomat&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sharmila Tagore, Actor&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amitabh Mukhopadhyay, former auditor, CAG&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mridula Mukherjee, historian&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aditya Mukherjee, historian&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amita Baviskar, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Arundhati Dhuru, activist, UP&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kavita Krishnan, activist, leader of women&amp;rsquo;s groups&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Reetika Khera, Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sanjay Kak, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Baba Adhav, labour leader&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Achyut Das, activist, Odisha&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ajit Ranade, economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kalpana Kannabiran, sociologist, lawyer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vasanth Kannabiran, teacher and activist, Andhra&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Paul Divakar, dalit activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Abha Sur, writer, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rajni Bakshi, writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ravi Chopra, activist, Uttarakhand&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Neelabh Mishra, writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Poornima Chikarmane, Pune&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Zoya Hasan , academic, political scientist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shabnam Hashmi, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rebecca John, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anandalakshmy, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Smita Gupta, Economist, Head of economic cell, AIDWA&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Praveen Jha, Economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Gautam Navlakha, senior activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Venkatesh Nayak, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Seema Mustafa, journalist, editor, The Citizen&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Bela Bhatia, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Bezwada Wilson, senior activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Haragopal, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sumit Chakravarty, Editor, Mainstream&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Gargi Chakravarty, Women&amp;rsquo;s activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Patricia Uberoi&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kamal Chenoy, senior academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Janaki Nair, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vipul Mudgal, journalist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Deepa Sinha, Right to Food activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Himanshu, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Uma Pillai, former civil servant&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nikhil Dey, activist, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; N.Rath, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Abey George,academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mahesh Pandya, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jyothi Krishnan, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Balram, activist, Jharkhand&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; AL Rangarajan, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rajaram Singh&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rameshwar Prasad, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anand Murugesan, academic&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Abha Bhaiya, women&amp;rsquo;s activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sagar Rabari, activist, Gujarat&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dhirendhra Singh&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rammanohar Reddy, former editor EPW, senior writer&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nandini K Oza, water activist, Maharasthra&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Osama Manzar, Digital Empowerment Foundation&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rakesh Sharma&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Pankti Jog, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rakesh Reddy Dubbudu, RTI activist, Telangana&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Subrat Das, economist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Umesh Anand, editor, Civil Society&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Charul,singer, cultural activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vinay, singer, writer, musician, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Maya Caroli&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ashwini Kulkarni, activist, Pune&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vibha Puri Das&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Surjit Das&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amrita Johri, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Madhuresh Kumar, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ankur Sarin&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dipak Dholakia&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Navdeep Mathur&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Harinesh, activist, Gujarat&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Persis Ginwalla&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shamsul Islam, theatre activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prafulla Samantara, activist, Odisha&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Lingraj Azad, activist, Odisha&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sunilam, activist, Madhya Pradesh&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aradhana Bhargava&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Meera Chaudhary, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Suniti SR, activist, Pune&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Suhas Kolhekar, activist Pune&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prasad Bagwe&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Gabrielle Dietrich, leader of Women&amp;rsquo;s groups&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Geetha Ramakrishnan, activist Tamil Nadu&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; R. Neelkandan&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; P Chennaiah, activist Telangana&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ramakrishnan Raju, activist, Andhra&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Richa Singh, activist, Uttar Pradesh&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sister Cella&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vimal Bhai, activist, Himachal Pradesh&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jabar Singh, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anand Mazgaonkar&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Krishnakanth&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kamayani Swami, activist, Bihar&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ashish Ranjan, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mahendra Yadav, activist&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Faisal Khan, activist, Haryana&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; JS Walla&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kailash Meena, activist, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amitava Mitra&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aveek Saha&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; BS Rawat&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rajendra Ravi&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shabnam Shaikh&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mahesh Pandya&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; S. Shylendra&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Iqbalkhan Pulli&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Soumen Ray&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ramachandra Prasad, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ravi M.&lt;br /&gt;
&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dipak Dholakia&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;br /&gt;
&lt;/div&gt;&#039;,
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$articleid = (int) 31154
$metaTitle = &#039;LATEST NEWS UPDATES | Activists, Academics Write Open Letter to PM Modi on the Drought&#039;
$metaKeywords = &#039;drought,Employment,Livelihood Security,MGNREGS,NREGA,mgnrega,NREGS,Fodder&#039;
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-TheWire.in

According to the central government&amp;rsquo;s statement to the Supreme Court last week, a third of the India&amp;rsquo;s districts are currently facing a severe drought. This means that at least 33 crore Indians are affected by ongoing the crisis.

Expressing their deep...&#039;
$disp = &#039;&lt;div align=&quot;justify&quot;&gt;-TheWire.in&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;em&gt;According to the central government&amp;rsquo;s statement to the Supreme Court last week, a third of the India&amp;rsquo;s districts are currently facing a severe drought. This means that at least 33 crore Indians are affected by ongoing the crisis.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Expressing their deep concern on the issue and the impact it is having on rural populations of the country, and asking that the government take appropriate relief measures immediately, more than 150 academics and activists have written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/em&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Dear Mr Prime Minister,&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;We wish to convey our deep collective anxiety about the enormous suffering of the rural poor in large parts of India&amp;rsquo;s countryside as they are battling drought, often for the second or even third consecutive year. In areas where rains have failed, farmers who depend mainly on rainwater to irrigate their crops have no or very low crop yields. Those who rely on irrigation are also affected, with groundwater sinking and streams and reservoirs drying up. All this adds to chronic agrarian distress reflected in a massive slowdown in agricultural growth during the last few years, with no imminent signs of recovery.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;The consequence of this adversity is massive distress movement of populations, causing broken childhoods, interrupted education, life in camps, city pavements or crowded shanties. Add to this the old and the infirm who are left behind, to beg for food or just quietly die. The cattle for whom there is no fodder, sold at distress prices or just abandoned to fend for themselves. And the drying up even of sources of water to drink.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;However, the response of central and state administrations to looming drought is sadly listless, lacking in both urgency and compassion. The scale of MGNREGA works is way below what is required and wages often remain unpaid for months. Even more gravely, the central and state governments are doing far too little to implement the National Food Security Act, three years after it came into force. Had the Act been in place, more than 80% of rural households in the poorer states would be able to secure about half of their monthly cereal requirements almost free of cost. In a drought situation food security entitlements should be made universal.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;In addition, we find no plans in most of the drought-hit regions for feeding the destitute, especially old persons left behind when families migrate, children without care-givers, the disabled and other vulnerable groups. ICDS centres could have been upgraded to supply emergency feeding to the destitute during the drought, but this has not happened. Under Supreme Court orders, school meals should be served on all days, including holidays, in drought-affected areas, but this is rarely the case. Arrangements to augment drinking water supply, including ensuring that marginalised hamlets have functioning tube-wells and transporting water where necessary, are awfully inadequate. There are also few attempts to create fodder banks and cattle camps. Most of these measures used to be a routine part of state response to drought, and were often undertaken with a great sense of urgency, but they are barely being considered today.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;The highest priority of the central government in a drought situation should be to ensure the creation of millions of additional person-days of work in all affected villages. Instead, the government has not even allocated enough funds this year to sustain the level of employment generated last year &amp;ndash; 233 crore person-days according to official data. At current levels of expenditure per person-day, this would cost well over 50,000 crore rupees. Yet the central government has allocated just 38,500 crore rupees to MGNREGA this year, of which more than 12,000 crore rupees are required to clear pending liabilities. These liabilities only prove the distress crores of workers have been put through because of wages left unpaid for months at a time. Unemployment allowance and mandatory compensation for delayed wage payments are also not paid, citing &amp;ldquo;insufficient funds&amp;rdquo;, resulting in a failure of the Act, and its legal safeguards. Most alarming today, is that instead of expanding, MGNREGA is all set to contract in this critical drought year, unless financial allocations are vastly expanded.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;The enormous distress &amp;ndash; of food, drinking water, work, fodder for animals, and dignity &amp;ndash; of hundred of millions is utterly unacceptable. We demand that the central government under your leadership acknowledges these failures and makes rapid amends, by implementing all the traditional relief measures as well as by ensuring full implementation of the National Food Security Act 2013 and the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act 2005 in letter and spirit.&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;Signed &amp;ndash;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aruna Roy, senior activist, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jean Dreze, Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jayati Ghosh, Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Harsh Mander, Activist, Writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Satish Deshpande, Academic, Sociologist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Deep Joshi, senior environmentalist and water activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prabhat Patnaik, Professor Emeritus, Economist, Senior academician&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amit Bhaduri, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vijay Vyas, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Utsa Patnaik, Professor and Senior Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Arundhati Roy, Writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Admiral Ramdas, former Chief of Naval Staff&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Lalita Ramdas, activist, Maharashtra&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Naseeruddin Shah, Actor&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Brinda Karat, Women&amp;rsquo;s leader, Politician&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Medha Patkar, Activist, politician, women&amp;rsquo;s leader&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shabana Azmi, Actor&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kavitha Kuruganti, Activist, leader of farmer&amp;rsquo;s groups&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nivedita Menon, Academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nandita Das, actor&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mukul Kesavan, writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Leela Samson, dancer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ashok Vajpeyi, writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Justice Rajinder Sachar, senior jurist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Syeda Hameed, women&amp;rsquo;s leader, former member Planning Commission&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shyam Benegal, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Himanshu Thakkar, environmentalist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Wajahat Habibullah, former Chief Information Commissioner&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Deepak Sandhu, former Chief Information Commissioner&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shailesh Gandhi, former Central Information Commissioner&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Uma Chakravarty, historian&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ritwick Dutta, environmental legal activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Trilochan Shastry, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jagdeep Chhokar, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Advocate Vrinda Grover&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nandini Sundar, Sociologist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shekhar Singh, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amar Kanwar, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prof C.P.Chandrasekhar, labour economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dilip Simeon, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prithvi Sharma, activist, also on behalf of ICAN&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Maja Daruwala, senior human rights activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mathew Cherian, Helpage&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; M. Krishna, Musician, Writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anand Patwardhan, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Lalit Mathur, former civil servant&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kavita Srivastava, PUCL, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anjali Bhardwaj, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Achin Vinayak, academic and activist, Delhi&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ram Rehman, photographer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Pamela Philipose, journalist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; A.Gandhi , academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rita Anand, senior journalist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nirmala Lakshman, senior journalist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Tripurari Sharma, Drama and Theater, playright&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Harsh Sethi, writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Madhu Bhaduri, former diplomat&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sharmila Tagore, Actor&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amitabh Mukhopadhyay, former auditor, CAG&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mridula Mukherjee, historian&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aditya Mukherjee, historian&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amita Baviskar, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Arundhati Dhuru, activist, UP&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kavita Krishnan, activist, leader of women&amp;rsquo;s groups&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Reetika Khera, Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sanjay Kak, filmmaker&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Baba Adhav, labour leader&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Achyut Das, activist, Odisha&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ajit Ranade, economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kalpana Kannabiran, sociologist, lawyer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vasanth Kannabiran, teacher and activist, Andhra&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Paul Divakar, dalit activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Abha Sur, writer, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rajni Bakshi, writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ravi Chopra, activist, Uttarakhand&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Neelabh Mishra, writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Poornima Chikarmane, Pune&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Zoya Hasan , academic, political scientist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shabnam Hashmi, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rebecca John, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anandalakshmy, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Smita Gupta, Economist, Head of economic cell, AIDWA&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Praveen Jha, Economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Gautam Navlakha, senior activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Venkatesh Nayak, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Seema Mustafa, journalist, editor, The Citizen&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Bela Bhatia, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Bezwada Wilson, senior activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Haragopal, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sumit Chakravarty, Editor, Mainstream&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Gargi Chakravarty, Women&amp;rsquo;s activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Patricia Uberoi&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kamal Chenoy, senior academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Janaki Nair, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vipul Mudgal, journalist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Deepa Sinha, Right to Food activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Himanshu, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Uma Pillai, former civil servant&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nikhil Dey, activist, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; N.Rath, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Abey George,academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mahesh Pandya, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jyothi Krishnan, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Balram, activist, Jharkhand&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; AL Rangarajan, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rajaram Singh&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rameshwar Prasad, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anand Murugesan, academic&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Abha Bhaiya, women&amp;rsquo;s activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sagar Rabari, activist, Gujarat&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dhirendhra Singh&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rammanohar Reddy, former editor EPW, senior writer&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Nandini K Oza, water activist, Maharasthra&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Osama Manzar, Digital Empowerment Foundation&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rakesh Sharma&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Pankti Jog, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rakesh Reddy Dubbudu, RTI activist, Telangana&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Subrat Das, economist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Umesh Anand, editor, Civil Society&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Charul,singer, cultural activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vinay, singer, writer, musician, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Maya Caroli&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ashwini Kulkarni, activist, Pune&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vibha Puri Das&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Surjit Das&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amrita Johri, RTI activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Madhuresh Kumar, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ankur Sarin&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dipak Dholakia&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Navdeep Mathur&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Harinesh, activist, Gujarat&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Persis Ginwalla&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shamsul Islam, theatre activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prafulla Samantara, activist, Odisha&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Lingraj Azad, activist, Odisha&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sunilam, activist, Madhya Pradesh&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aradhana Bhargava&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Meera Chaudhary, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Suniti SR, activist, Pune&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Suhas Kolhekar, activist Pune&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Prasad Bagwe&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Gabrielle Dietrich, leader of Women&amp;rsquo;s groups&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Geetha Ramakrishnan, activist Tamil Nadu&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; R. Neelkandan&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; P Chennaiah, activist Telangana&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ramakrishnan Raju, activist, Andhra&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Richa Singh, activist, Uttar Pradesh&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Sister Cella&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Vimal Bhai, activist, Himachal Pradesh&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Jabar Singh, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Anand Mazgaonkar&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Krishnakanth&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kamayani Swami, activist, Bihar&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ashish Ranjan, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mahendra Yadav, activist&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Faisal Khan, activist, Haryana&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; JS Walla&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Kailash Meena, activist, Rajasthan&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Amitava Mitra&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Aveek Saha&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; BS Rawat&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Rajendra Ravi&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Shabnam Shaikh&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Mahesh Pandya&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; S. Shylendra&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Iqbalkhan Pulli&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Soumen Ray&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ramachandra Prasad, ICAN&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Ravi M.&lt;br /&gt;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp;&amp;nbsp; Dipak Dholakia&lt;br /&gt;&lt;br /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;&#039;
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Cake\Http\Runner::run() - CORE/src/Http/Runner.php, line 51</pre></div></pre>latest-news-updates/activists-academics-write-open-letter-to-pm-modi-on-the-drought-4679222.html"/>
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According to the central government&rsquo;s statement to the Supreme Court last week, a third of the India&rsquo;s districts are currently facing a severe drought. This means that at least 33 crore Indians are affected by ongoing the crisis.

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                <strong>Activists, Academics Write Open Letter to PM Modi on the Drought</strong></h1>
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                <div align="justify">-TheWire.in<br /><br /><em>According to the central government&rsquo;s statement to the Supreme Court last week, a third of the India&rsquo;s districts are currently facing a severe drought. This means that at least 33 crore Indians are affected by ongoing the crisis.<br /><br />Expressing their deep concern on the issue and the impact it is having on rural populations of the country, and asking that the government take appropriate relief measures immediately, more than 150 academics and activists have written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi.<br /></em><br />Dear Mr Prime Minister,<br /><br />We wish to convey our deep collective anxiety about the enormous suffering of the rural poor in large parts of India&rsquo;s countryside as they are battling drought, often for the second or even third consecutive year. In areas where rains have failed, farmers who depend mainly on rainwater to irrigate their crops have no or very low crop yields. Those who rely on irrigation are also affected, with groundwater sinking and streams and reservoirs drying up. All this adds to chronic agrarian distress reflected in a massive slowdown in agricultural growth during the last few years, with no imminent signs of recovery.<br /><br />The consequence of this adversity is massive distress movement of populations, causing broken childhoods, interrupted education, life in camps, city pavements or crowded shanties. Add to this the old and the infirm who are left behind, to beg for food or just quietly die. The cattle for whom there is no fodder, sold at distress prices or just abandoned to fend for themselves. And the drying up even of sources of water to drink.<br /><br />However, the response of central and state administrations to looming drought is sadly listless, lacking in both urgency and compassion. The scale of MGNREGA works is way below what is required and wages often remain unpaid for months. Even more gravely, the central and state governments are doing far too little to implement the National Food Security Act, three years after it came into force. Had the Act been in place, more than 80% of rural households in the poorer states would be able to secure about half of their monthly cereal requirements almost free of cost. In a drought situation food security entitlements should be made universal.<br /><br />In addition, we find no plans in most of the drought-hit regions for feeding the destitute, especially old persons left behind when families migrate, children without care-givers, the disabled and other vulnerable groups. ICDS centres could have been upgraded to supply emergency feeding to the destitute during the drought, but this has not happened. Under Supreme Court orders, school meals should be served on all days, including holidays, in drought-affected areas, but this is rarely the case. Arrangements to augment drinking water supply, including ensuring that marginalised hamlets have functioning tube-wells and transporting water where necessary, are awfully inadequate. There are also few attempts to create fodder banks and cattle camps. Most of these measures used to be a routine part of state response to drought, and were often undertaken with a great sense of urgency, but they are barely being considered today.<br /><br />The highest priority of the central government in a drought situation should be to ensure the creation of millions of additional person-days of work in all affected villages. Instead, the government has not even allocated enough funds this year to sustain the level of employment generated last year &ndash; 233 crore person-days according to official data. At current levels of expenditure per person-day, this would cost well over 50,000 crore rupees. Yet the central government has allocated just 38,500 crore rupees to MGNREGA this year, of which more than 12,000 crore rupees are required to clear pending liabilities. These liabilities only prove the distress crores of workers have been put through because of wages left unpaid for months at a time. Unemployment allowance and mandatory compensation for delayed wage payments are also not paid, citing &ldquo;insufficient funds&rdquo;, resulting in a failure of the Act, and its legal safeguards. Most alarming today, is that instead of expanding, MGNREGA is all set to contract in this critical drought year, unless financial allocations are vastly expanded.<br /><br />The enormous distress &ndash; of food, drinking water, work, fodder for animals, and dignity &ndash; of hundred of millions is utterly unacceptable. We demand that the central government under your leadership acknowledges these failures and makes rapid amends, by implementing all the traditional relief measures as well as by ensuring full implementation of the National Food Security Act 2013 and the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act 2005 in letter and spirit.<br /><br />Signed &ndash;<br /><br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Aruna Roy, senior activist, Rajasthan<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Jean Dreze, Economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Jayati Ghosh, Economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Harsh Mander, Activist, Writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Satish Deshpande, Academic, Sociologist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Deep Joshi, senior environmentalist and water activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Prabhat Patnaik, Professor Emeritus, Economist, Senior academician<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amit Bhaduri, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vijay Vyas, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Utsa Patnaik, Professor and Senior Economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Arundhati Roy, Writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Admiral Ramdas, former Chief of Naval Staff<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Lalita Ramdas, activist, Maharashtra<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Naseeruddin Shah, Actor<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Brinda Karat, Women&rsquo;s leader, Politician<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Medha Patkar, Activist, politician, women&rsquo;s leader<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shabana Azmi, Actor<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kavitha Kuruganti, Activist, leader of farmer&rsquo;s groups<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nivedita Menon, Academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nandita Das, actor<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mukul Kesavan, writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Leela Samson, dancer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ashok Vajpeyi, writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Justice Rajinder Sachar, senior jurist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Syeda Hameed, women&rsquo;s leader, former member Planning Commission<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shyam Benegal, filmmaker<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Himanshu Thakkar, environmentalist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Wajahat Habibullah, former Chief Information Commissioner<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Deepak Sandhu, former Chief Information Commissioner<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shailesh Gandhi, former Central Information Commissioner<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Uma Chakravarty, historian<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ritwick Dutta, environmental legal activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Trilochan Shastry, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Jagdeep Chhokar, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Advocate Vrinda Grover<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nandini Sundar, Sociologist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shekhar Singh, RTI activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amar Kanwar, filmmaker<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Prof C.P.Chandrasekhar, labour economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Dilip Simeon, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Prithvi Sharma, activist, also on behalf of ICAN<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Maja Daruwala, senior human rights activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mathew Cherian, Helpage<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; M. Krishna, Musician, Writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Anand Patwardhan, filmmaker<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Lalit Mathur, former civil servant<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kavita Srivastava, PUCL, Rajasthan<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Anjali Bhardwaj, RTI activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Achin Vinayak, academic and activist, Delhi<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ram Rehman, photographer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Pamela Philipose, journalist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; A.Gandhi , academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rita Anand, senior journalist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nirmala Lakshman, senior journalist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Tripurari Sharma, Drama and Theater, playright<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Harsh Sethi, writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Madhu Bhaduri, former diplomat<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sharmila Tagore, Actor<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amitabh Mukhopadhyay, former auditor, CAG<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mridula Mukherjee, historian<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Aditya Mukherjee, historian<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amita Baviskar, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Arundhati Dhuru, activist, UP<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kavita Krishnan, activist, leader of women&rsquo;s groups<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Reetika Khera, Economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sanjay Kak, filmmaker<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Baba Adhav, labour leader<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Achyut Das, activist, Odisha<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ajit Ranade, economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kalpana Kannabiran, sociologist, lawyer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vasanth Kannabiran, teacher and activist, Andhra<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Paul Divakar, dalit activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Abha Sur, writer, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rajni Bakshi, writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ravi Chopra, activist, Uttarakhand<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Neelabh Mishra, writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Poornima Chikarmane, Pune<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Zoya Hasan , academic, political scientist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shabnam Hashmi, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rebecca John, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Anandalakshmy, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Smita Gupta, Economist, Head of economic cell, AIDWA<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Praveen Jha, Economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Gautam Navlakha, senior activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Venkatesh Nayak, RTI activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Seema Mustafa, journalist, editor, The Citizen<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Bela Bhatia, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Bezwada Wilson, senior activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Haragopal, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sumit Chakravarty, Editor, Mainstream<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Gargi Chakravarty, Women&rsquo;s activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Patricia Uberoi<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kamal Chenoy, senior academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Janaki Nair, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vipul Mudgal, journalist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Deepa Sinha, Right to Food activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Himanshu, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Uma Pillai, former civil servant<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nikhil Dey, activist, Rajasthan<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; N.Rath, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Abey George,academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mahesh Pandya, ICAN<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Jyothi Krishnan, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Balram, activist, Jharkhand<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; AL Rangarajan, ICAN<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rajaram Singh<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rameshwar Prasad, ICAN<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Anand Murugesan, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Abha Bhaiya, women&rsquo;s activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sagar Rabari, activist, Gujarat<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Dhirendhra Singh<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rammanohar Reddy, former editor EPW, senior writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nandini K Oza, water activist, Maharasthra<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Osama Manzar, Digital Empowerment Foundation<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rakesh Sharma<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Pankti Jog, RTI activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rakesh Reddy Dubbudu, RTI activist, Telangana<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Subrat Das, economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Umesh Anand, editor, Civil Society<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Charul,singer, cultural activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vinay, singer, writer, musician, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Maya Caroli<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ashwini Kulkarni, activist, Pune<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vibha Puri Das<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Surjit Das<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amrita Johri, RTI activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Madhuresh Kumar, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ankur Sarin<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Dipak Dholakia<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Navdeep Mathur<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Harinesh, activist, Gujarat<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Persis Ginwalla<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shamsul Islam, theatre activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Prafulla Samantara, activist, Odisha<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Lingraj Azad, activist, Odisha<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sunilam, activist, Madhya Pradesh<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Aradhana Bhargava<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Meera Chaudhary, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Suniti SR, activist, Pune<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Suhas Kolhekar, activist Pune<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Prasad Bagwe<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Gabrielle Dietrich, leader of Women&rsquo;s groups<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Geetha Ramakrishnan, activist Tamil Nadu<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; R. Neelkandan<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; P Chennaiah, activist Telangana<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ramakrishnan Raju, activist, Andhra<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Richa Singh, activist, Uttar Pradesh<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sister Cella<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vimal Bhai, activist, Himachal Pradesh<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Jabar Singh, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Anand Mazgaonkar<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Krishnakanth<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kamayani Swami, activist, Bihar<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ashish Ranjan, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mahendra Yadav, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Faisal Khan, activist, Haryana<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; JS Walla<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kailash Meena, activist, Rajasthan<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amitava Mitra<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Aveek Saha<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; BS Rawat<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rajendra Ravi<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shabnam Shaikh<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mahesh Pandya<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; S. Shylendra<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Iqbalkhan Pulli<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Soumen Ray<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ramachandra Prasad, ICAN<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ravi M.<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Dipak Dholakia<br /><br /></div>               </font>
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		'title' => 'Activists, Academics Write Open Letter to PM Modi on the Drought',
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-TheWire.in<br />
<br />
<em>According to the central government&rsquo;s statement to the Supreme Court last week, a third of the India&rsquo;s districts are currently facing a severe drought. This means that at least 33 crore Indians are affected by ongoing the crisis.<br />
<br />
Expressing their deep concern on the issue and the impact it is having on rural populations of the country, and asking that the government take appropriate relief measures immediately, more than 150 academics and activists have written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi.<br />
</em><br />
Dear Mr Prime Minister,<br />
<br />
We wish to convey our deep collective anxiety about the enormous suffering of the rural poor in large parts of India&rsquo;s countryside as they are battling drought, often for the second or even third consecutive year. In areas where rains have failed, farmers who depend mainly on rainwater to irrigate their crops have no or very low crop yields. Those who rely on irrigation are also affected, with groundwater sinking and streams and reservoirs drying up. All this adds to chronic agrarian distress reflected in a massive slowdown in agricultural growth during the last few years, with no imminent signs of recovery.<br />
<br />
The consequence of this adversity is massive distress movement of populations, causing broken childhoods, interrupted education, life in camps, city pavements or crowded shanties. Add to this the old and the infirm who are left behind, to beg for food or just quietly die. The cattle for whom there is no fodder, sold at distress prices or just abandoned to fend for themselves. And the drying up even of sources of water to drink.<br />
<br />
However, the response of central and state administrations to looming drought is sadly listless, lacking in both urgency and compassion. The scale of MGNREGA works is way below what is required and wages often remain unpaid for months. Even more gravely, the central and state governments are doing far too little to implement the National Food Security Act, three years after it came into force. Had the Act been in place, more than 80% of rural households in the poorer states would be able to secure about half of their monthly cereal requirements almost free of cost. In a drought situation food security entitlements should be made universal.<br />
<br />
In addition, we find no plans in most of the drought-hit regions for feeding the destitute, especially old persons left behind when families migrate, children without care-givers, the disabled and other vulnerable groups. ICDS centres could have been upgraded to supply emergency feeding to the destitute during the drought, but this has not happened. Under Supreme Court orders, school meals should be served on all days, including holidays, in drought-affected areas, but this is rarely the case. Arrangements to augment drinking water supply, including ensuring that marginalised hamlets have functioning tube-wells and transporting water where necessary, are awfully inadequate. There are also few attempts to create fodder banks and cattle camps. Most of these measures used to be a routine part of state response to drought, and were often undertaken with a great sense of urgency, but they are barely being considered today.<br />
<br />
The highest priority of the central government in a drought situation should be to ensure the creation of millions of additional person-days of work in all affected villages. Instead, the government has not even allocated enough funds this year to sustain the level of employment generated last year &ndash; 233 crore person-days according to official data. At current levels of expenditure per person-day, this would cost well over 50,000 crore rupees. Yet the central government has allocated just 38,500 crore rupees to MGNREGA this year, of which more than 12,000 crore rupees are required to clear pending liabilities. These liabilities only prove the distress crores of workers have been put through because of wages left unpaid for months at a time. Unemployment allowance and mandatory compensation for delayed wage payments are also not paid, citing &ldquo;insufficient funds&rdquo;, resulting in a failure of the Act, and its legal safeguards. Most alarming today, is that instead of expanding, MGNREGA is all set to contract in this critical drought year, unless financial allocations are vastly expanded.<br />
<br />
The enormous distress &ndash; of food, drinking water, work, fodder for animals, and dignity &ndash; of hundred of millions is utterly unacceptable. We demand that the central government under your leadership acknowledges these failures and makes rapid amends, by implementing all the traditional relief measures as well as by ensuring full implementation of the National Food Security Act 2013 and the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act 2005 in letter and spirit.<br />
<br />
Signed &ndash;<br />
<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Aruna Roy, senior activist, Rajasthan<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Jean Dreze, Economist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Jayati Ghosh, Economist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Harsh Mander, Activist, Writer<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Satish Deshpande, Academic, Sociologist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Deep Joshi, senior environmentalist and water activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Prabhat Patnaik, Professor Emeritus, Economist, Senior academician<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amit Bhaduri, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vijay Vyas, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Utsa Patnaik, Professor and Senior Economist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Arundhati Roy, Writer<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Admiral Ramdas, former Chief of Naval Staff<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Lalita Ramdas, activist, Maharashtra<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Naseeruddin Shah, Actor<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Brinda Karat, Women&rsquo;s leader, Politician<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Medha Patkar, Activist, politician, women&rsquo;s leader<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shabana Azmi, Actor<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kavitha Kuruganti, Activist, leader of farmer&rsquo;s groups<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nivedita Menon, Academic<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nandita Das, actor<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mukul Kesavan, writer<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Leela Samson, dancer<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ashok Vajpeyi, writer<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Justice Rajinder Sachar, senior jurist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Syeda Hameed, women&rsquo;s leader, former member Planning Commission<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shyam Benegal, filmmaker<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Himanshu Thakkar, environmentalist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Wajahat Habibullah, former Chief Information Commissioner<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Deepak Sandhu, former Chief Information Commissioner<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shailesh Gandhi, former Central Information Commissioner<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Uma Chakravarty, historian<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ritwick Dutta, environmental legal activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Trilochan Shastry, academic<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Jagdeep Chhokar, academic<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Advocate Vrinda Grover<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nandini Sundar, Sociologist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shekhar Singh, RTI activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amar Kanwar, filmmaker<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Prof C.P.Chandrasekhar, labour economist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Dilip Simeon, academic<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Prithvi Sharma, activist, also on behalf of ICAN<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Maja Daruwala, senior human rights activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mathew Cherian, Helpage<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; M. Krishna, Musician, Writer<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Anand Patwardhan, filmmaker<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Lalit Mathur, former civil servant<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kavita Srivastava, PUCL, Rajasthan<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Anjali Bhardwaj, RTI activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Achin Vinayak, academic and activist, Delhi<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ram Rehman, photographer<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Pamela Philipose, journalist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; A.Gandhi , academic<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rita Anand, senior journalist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nirmala Lakshman, senior journalist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Tripurari Sharma, Drama and Theater, playright<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Harsh Sethi, writer<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Madhu Bhaduri, former diplomat<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sharmila Tagore, Actor<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amitabh Mukhopadhyay, former auditor, CAG<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mridula Mukherjee, historian<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Aditya Mukherjee, historian<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amita Baviskar, academic<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Arundhati Dhuru, activist, UP<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kavita Krishnan, activist, leader of women&rsquo;s groups<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Reetika Khera, Economist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sanjay Kak, filmmaker<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Baba Adhav, labour leader<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Achyut Das, activist, Odisha<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ajit Ranade, economist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kalpana Kannabiran, sociologist, lawyer<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vasanth Kannabiran, teacher and activist, Andhra<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Paul Divakar, dalit activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Abha Sur, writer, academic<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rajni Bakshi, writer<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ravi Chopra, activist, Uttarakhand<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Neelabh Mishra, writer<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Poornima Chikarmane, Pune<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Zoya Hasan , academic, political scientist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shabnam Hashmi, activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rebecca John, academic<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Anandalakshmy, academic<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Smita Gupta, Economist, Head of economic cell, AIDWA<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Praveen Jha, Economist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Gautam Navlakha, senior activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Venkatesh Nayak, RTI activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Seema Mustafa, journalist, editor, The Citizen<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Bela Bhatia, academic<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Bezwada Wilson, senior activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Haragopal, academic<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sumit Chakravarty, Editor, Mainstream<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Gargi Chakravarty, Women&rsquo;s activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Patricia Uberoi<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kamal Chenoy, senior academic<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Janaki Nair, academic<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vipul Mudgal, journalist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Deepa Sinha, Right to Food activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Himanshu, activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Uma Pillai, former civil servant<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nikhil Dey, activist, Rajasthan<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; N.Rath, academic<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Abey George,academic<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mahesh Pandya, ICAN<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Jyothi Krishnan, academic<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Balram, activist, Jharkhand<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; AL Rangarajan, ICAN<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rajaram Singh<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rameshwar Prasad, ICAN<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Anand Murugesan, academic<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Abha Bhaiya, women&rsquo;s activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sagar Rabari, activist, Gujarat<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Dhirendhra Singh<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rammanohar Reddy, former editor EPW, senior writer<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nandini K Oza, water activist, Maharasthra<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Osama Manzar, Digital Empowerment Foundation<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rakesh Sharma<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Pankti Jog, RTI activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rakesh Reddy Dubbudu, RTI activist, Telangana<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Subrat Das, economist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Umesh Anand, editor, Civil Society<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Charul,singer, cultural activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vinay, singer, writer, musician, activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Maya Caroli<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ashwini Kulkarni, activist, Pune<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vibha Puri Das<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Surjit Das<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amrita Johri, RTI activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Madhuresh Kumar, activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ankur Sarin<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Dipak Dholakia<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Navdeep Mathur<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Harinesh, activist, Gujarat<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Persis Ginwalla<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shamsul Islam, theatre activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Prafulla Samantara, activist, Odisha<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Lingraj Azad, activist, Odisha<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sunilam, activist, Madhya Pradesh<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Aradhana Bhargava<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Meera Chaudhary, activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Suniti SR, activist, Pune<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Suhas Kolhekar, activist Pune<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Prasad Bagwe<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Gabrielle Dietrich, leader of Women&rsquo;s groups<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Geetha Ramakrishnan, activist Tamil Nadu<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; R. Neelkandan<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; P Chennaiah, activist Telangana<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ramakrishnan Raju, activist, Andhra<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Richa Singh, activist, Uttar Pradesh<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sister Cella<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vimal Bhai, activist, Himachal Pradesh<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Jabar Singh, activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Anand Mazgaonkar<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Krishnakanth<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kamayani Swami, activist, Bihar<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ashish Ranjan, activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mahendra Yadav, activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Faisal Khan, activist, Haryana<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; JS Walla<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kailash Meena, activist, Rajasthan<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amitava Mitra<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Aveek Saha<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; BS Rawat<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rajendra Ravi<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shabnam Shaikh<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mahesh Pandya<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; S. Shylendra<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Iqbalkhan Pulli<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Soumen Ray<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ramachandra Prasad, ICAN<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ravi M.<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Dipak Dholakia<br />
<br />
</div>',
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	'metaTitle' => 'LATEST NEWS UPDATES | Activists, Academics Write Open Letter to PM Modi on the Drought',
	'metaKeywords' => 'drought,Employment,Livelihood Security,MGNREGS,NREGA,mgnrega,NREGS,Fodder',
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-TheWire.in

According to the central government&rsquo;s statement to the Supreme Court last week, a third of the India&rsquo;s districts are currently facing a severe drought. This means that at least 33 crore Indians are affected by ongoing the crisis.

Expressing their deep...',
	'disp' => '<div align="justify">-TheWire.in<br /><br /><em>According to the central government&rsquo;s statement to the Supreme Court last week, a third of the India&rsquo;s districts are currently facing a severe drought. This means that at least 33 crore Indians are affected by ongoing the crisis.<br /><br />Expressing their deep concern on the issue and the impact it is having on rural populations of the country, and asking that the government take appropriate relief measures immediately, more than 150 academics and activists have written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi.<br /></em><br />Dear Mr Prime Minister,<br /><br />We wish to convey our deep collective anxiety about the enormous suffering of the rural poor in large parts of India&rsquo;s countryside as they are battling drought, often for the second or even third consecutive year. In areas where rains have failed, farmers who depend mainly on rainwater to irrigate their crops have no or very low crop yields. Those who rely on irrigation are also affected, with groundwater sinking and streams and reservoirs drying up. All this adds to chronic agrarian distress reflected in a massive slowdown in agricultural growth during the last few years, with no imminent signs of recovery.<br /><br />The consequence of this adversity is massive distress movement of populations, causing broken childhoods, interrupted education, life in camps, city pavements or crowded shanties. Add to this the old and the infirm who are left behind, to beg for food or just quietly die. The cattle for whom there is no fodder, sold at distress prices or just abandoned to fend for themselves. And the drying up even of sources of water to drink.<br /><br />However, the response of central and state administrations to looming drought is sadly listless, lacking in both urgency and compassion. The scale of MGNREGA works is way below what is required and wages often remain unpaid for months. Even more gravely, the central and state governments are doing far too little to implement the National Food Security Act, three years after it came into force. Had the Act been in place, more than 80% of rural households in the poorer states would be able to secure about half of their monthly cereal requirements almost free of cost. In a drought situation food security entitlements should be made universal.<br /><br />In addition, we find no plans in most of the drought-hit regions for feeding the destitute, especially old persons left behind when families migrate, children without care-givers, the disabled and other vulnerable groups. ICDS centres could have been upgraded to supply emergency feeding to the destitute during the drought, but this has not happened. Under Supreme Court orders, school meals should be served on all days, including holidays, in drought-affected areas, but this is rarely the case. Arrangements to augment drinking water supply, including ensuring that marginalised hamlets have functioning tube-wells and transporting water where necessary, are awfully inadequate. There are also few attempts to create fodder banks and cattle camps. Most of these measures used to be a routine part of state response to drought, and were often undertaken with a great sense of urgency, but they are barely being considered today.<br /><br />The highest priority of the central government in a drought situation should be to ensure the creation of millions of additional person-days of work in all affected villages. Instead, the government has not even allocated enough funds this year to sustain the level of employment generated last year &ndash; 233 crore person-days according to official data. At current levels of expenditure per person-day, this would cost well over 50,000 crore rupees. Yet the central government has allocated just 38,500 crore rupees to MGNREGA this year, of which more than 12,000 crore rupees are required to clear pending liabilities. These liabilities only prove the distress crores of workers have been put through because of wages left unpaid for months at a time. Unemployment allowance and mandatory compensation for delayed wage payments are also not paid, citing &ldquo;insufficient funds&rdquo;, resulting in a failure of the Act, and its legal safeguards. Most alarming today, is that instead of expanding, MGNREGA is all set to contract in this critical drought year, unless financial allocations are vastly expanded.<br /><br />The enormous distress &ndash; of food, drinking water, work, fodder for animals, and dignity &ndash; of hundred of millions is utterly unacceptable. We demand that the central government under your leadership acknowledges these failures and makes rapid amends, by implementing all the traditional relief measures as well as by ensuring full implementation of the National Food Security Act 2013 and the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act 2005 in letter and spirit.<br /><br />Signed &ndash;<br /><br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Aruna Roy, senior activist, Rajasthan<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Jean Dreze, Economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Jayati Ghosh, Economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Harsh Mander, Activist, Writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Satish Deshpande, Academic, Sociologist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Deep Joshi, senior environmentalist and water activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Prabhat Patnaik, Professor Emeritus, Economist, Senior academician<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amit Bhaduri, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vijay Vyas, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Utsa Patnaik, Professor and Senior Economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Arundhati Roy, Writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Admiral Ramdas, former Chief of Naval Staff<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Lalita Ramdas, activist, Maharashtra<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Naseeruddin Shah, Actor<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Brinda Karat, Women&rsquo;s leader, Politician<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Medha Patkar, Activist, politician, women&rsquo;s leader<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shabana Azmi, Actor<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kavitha Kuruganti, Activist, leader of farmer&rsquo;s groups<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nivedita Menon, Academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nandita Das, actor<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mukul Kesavan, writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Leela Samson, dancer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ashok Vajpeyi, writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Justice Rajinder Sachar, senior jurist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Syeda Hameed, women&rsquo;s leader, former member Planning Commission<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shyam Benegal, filmmaker<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Himanshu Thakkar, environmentalist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Wajahat Habibullah, former Chief Information Commissioner<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Deepak Sandhu, former Chief Information Commissioner<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shailesh Gandhi, former Central Information Commissioner<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Uma Chakravarty, historian<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ritwick Dutta, environmental legal activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Trilochan Shastry, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Jagdeep Chhokar, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Advocate Vrinda Grover<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nandini Sundar, Sociologist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shekhar Singh, RTI activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amar Kanwar, filmmaker<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Prof C.P.Chandrasekhar, labour economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Dilip Simeon, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Prithvi Sharma, activist, also on behalf of ICAN<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Maja Daruwala, senior human rights activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mathew Cherian, Helpage<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; M. Krishna, Musician, Writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Anand Patwardhan, filmmaker<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Lalit Mathur, former civil servant<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kavita Srivastava, PUCL, Rajasthan<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Anjali Bhardwaj, RTI activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Achin Vinayak, academic and activist, Delhi<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ram Rehman, photographer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Pamela Philipose, journalist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; A.Gandhi , academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rita Anand, senior journalist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nirmala Lakshman, senior journalist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Tripurari Sharma, Drama and Theater, playright<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Harsh Sethi, writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Madhu Bhaduri, former diplomat<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sharmila Tagore, Actor<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amitabh Mukhopadhyay, former auditor, CAG<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mridula Mukherjee, historian<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Aditya Mukherjee, historian<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amita Baviskar, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Arundhati Dhuru, activist, UP<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kavita Krishnan, activist, leader of women&rsquo;s groups<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Reetika Khera, Economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sanjay Kak, filmmaker<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Baba Adhav, labour leader<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Achyut Das, activist, Odisha<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ajit Ranade, economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kalpana Kannabiran, sociologist, lawyer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vasanth Kannabiran, teacher and activist, Andhra<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Paul Divakar, dalit activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Abha Sur, writer, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rajni Bakshi, writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ravi Chopra, activist, Uttarakhand<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Neelabh Mishra, writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Poornima Chikarmane, Pune<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Zoya Hasan , academic, political scientist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shabnam Hashmi, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rebecca John, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Anandalakshmy, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Smita Gupta, Economist, Head of economic cell, AIDWA<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Praveen Jha, Economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Gautam Navlakha, senior activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Venkatesh Nayak, RTI activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Seema Mustafa, journalist, editor, The Citizen<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Bela Bhatia, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Bezwada Wilson, senior activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Haragopal, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sumit Chakravarty, Editor, Mainstream<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Gargi Chakravarty, Women&rsquo;s activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Patricia Uberoi<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kamal Chenoy, senior academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Janaki Nair, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vipul Mudgal, journalist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Deepa Sinha, Right to Food activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Himanshu, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Uma Pillai, former civil servant<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nikhil Dey, activist, Rajasthan<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; N.Rath, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Abey George,academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mahesh Pandya, ICAN<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Jyothi Krishnan, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Balram, activist, Jharkhand<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; AL Rangarajan, ICAN<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rajaram Singh<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rameshwar Prasad, ICAN<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Anand Murugesan, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Abha Bhaiya, women&rsquo;s activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sagar Rabari, activist, Gujarat<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Dhirendhra Singh<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rammanohar Reddy, former editor EPW, senior writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nandini K Oza, water activist, Maharasthra<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Osama Manzar, Digital Empowerment Foundation<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rakesh Sharma<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Pankti Jog, RTI activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rakesh Reddy Dubbudu, RTI activist, Telangana<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Subrat Das, economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Umesh Anand, editor, Civil Society<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Charul,singer, cultural activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vinay, singer, writer, musician, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Maya Caroli<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ashwini Kulkarni, activist, Pune<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vibha Puri Das<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Surjit Das<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amrita Johri, RTI activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Madhuresh Kumar, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ankur Sarin<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Dipak Dholakia<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Navdeep Mathur<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Harinesh, activist, Gujarat<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Persis Ginwalla<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shamsul Islam, theatre activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Prafulla Samantara, activist, Odisha<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Lingraj Azad, activist, Odisha<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sunilam, activist, Madhya Pradesh<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Aradhana Bhargava<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Meera Chaudhary, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Suniti SR, activist, Pune<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Suhas Kolhekar, activist Pune<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Prasad Bagwe<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Gabrielle Dietrich, leader of Women&rsquo;s groups<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Geetha Ramakrishnan, activist Tamil Nadu<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; R. Neelkandan<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; P Chennaiah, activist Telangana<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ramakrishnan Raju, activist, Andhra<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Richa Singh, activist, Uttar Pradesh<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sister Cella<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vimal Bhai, activist, Himachal Pradesh<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Jabar Singh, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Anand Mazgaonkar<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Krishnakanth<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kamayani Swami, activist, Bihar<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ashish Ranjan, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mahendra Yadav, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Faisal Khan, activist, Haryana<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; JS Walla<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kailash Meena, activist, Rajasthan<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amitava Mitra<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Aveek Saha<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; BS Rawat<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rajendra Ravi<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shabnam Shaikh<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mahesh Pandya<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; S. Shylendra<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Iqbalkhan Pulli<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Soumen Ray<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ramachandra Prasad, ICAN<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ravi M.<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Dipak Dholakia<br /><br /></div>',
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	'title' => 'Activists, Academics Write Open Letter to PM Modi on the Drought',
	'subheading' => '',
	'description' => '<div align="justify">
-TheWire.in<br />
<br />
<em>According to the central government&rsquo;s statement to the Supreme Court last week, a third of the India&rsquo;s districts are currently facing a severe drought. This means that at least 33 crore Indians are affected by ongoing the crisis.<br />
<br />
Expressing their deep concern on the issue and the impact it is having on rural populations of the country, and asking that the government take appropriate relief measures immediately, more than 150 academics and activists have written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi.<br />
</em><br />
Dear Mr Prime Minister,<br />
<br />
We wish to convey our deep collective anxiety about the enormous suffering of the rural poor in large parts of India&rsquo;s countryside as they are battling drought, often for the second or even third consecutive year. In areas where rains have failed, farmers who depend mainly on rainwater to irrigate their crops have no or very low crop yields. Those who rely on irrigation are also affected, with groundwater sinking and streams and reservoirs drying up. All this adds to chronic agrarian distress reflected in a massive slowdown in agricultural growth during the last few years, with no imminent signs of recovery.<br />
<br />
The consequence of this adversity is massive distress movement of populations, causing broken childhoods, interrupted education, life in camps, city pavements or crowded shanties. Add to this the old and the infirm who are left behind, to beg for food or just quietly die. The cattle for whom there is no fodder, sold at distress prices or just abandoned to fend for themselves. And the drying up even of sources of water to drink.<br />
<br />
However, the response of central and state administrations to looming drought is sadly listless, lacking in both urgency and compassion. The scale of MGNREGA works is way below what is required and wages often remain unpaid for months. Even more gravely, the central and state governments are doing far too little to implement the National Food Security Act, three years after it came into force. Had the Act been in place, more than 80% of rural households in the poorer states would be able to secure about half of their monthly cereal requirements almost free of cost. In a drought situation food security entitlements should be made universal.<br />
<br />
In addition, we find no plans in most of the drought-hit regions for feeding the destitute, especially old persons left behind when families migrate, children without care-givers, the disabled and other vulnerable groups. ICDS centres could have been upgraded to supply emergency feeding to the destitute during the drought, but this has not happened. Under Supreme Court orders, school meals should be served on all days, including holidays, in drought-affected areas, but this is rarely the case. Arrangements to augment drinking water supply, including ensuring that marginalised hamlets have functioning tube-wells and transporting water where necessary, are awfully inadequate. There are also few attempts to create fodder banks and cattle camps. Most of these measures used to be a routine part of state response to drought, and were often undertaken with a great sense of urgency, but they are barely being considered today.<br />
<br />
The highest priority of the central government in a drought situation should be to ensure the creation of millions of additional person-days of work in all affected villages. Instead, the government has not even allocated enough funds this year to sustain the level of employment generated last year &ndash; 233 crore person-days according to official data. At current levels of expenditure per person-day, this would cost well over 50,000 crore rupees. Yet the central government has allocated just 38,500 crore rupees to MGNREGA this year, of which more than 12,000 crore rupees are required to clear pending liabilities. These liabilities only prove the distress crores of workers have been put through because of wages left unpaid for months at a time. Unemployment allowance and mandatory compensation for delayed wage payments are also not paid, citing &ldquo;insufficient funds&rdquo;, resulting in a failure of the Act, and its legal safeguards. Most alarming today, is that instead of expanding, MGNREGA is all set to contract in this critical drought year, unless financial allocations are vastly expanded.<br />
<br />
The enormous distress &ndash; of food, drinking water, work, fodder for animals, and dignity &ndash; of hundred of millions is utterly unacceptable. We demand that the central government under your leadership acknowledges these failures and makes rapid amends, by implementing all the traditional relief measures as well as by ensuring full implementation of the National Food Security Act 2013 and the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act 2005 in letter and spirit.<br />
<br />
Signed &ndash;<br />
<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Aruna Roy, senior activist, Rajasthan<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Jean Dreze, Economist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Jayati Ghosh, Economist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Harsh Mander, Activist, Writer<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Satish Deshpande, Academic, Sociologist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Deep Joshi, senior environmentalist and water activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Prabhat Patnaik, Professor Emeritus, Economist, Senior academician<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amit Bhaduri, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vijay Vyas, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Utsa Patnaik, Professor and Senior Economist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Arundhati Roy, Writer<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Admiral Ramdas, former Chief of Naval Staff<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Lalita Ramdas, activist, Maharashtra<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Naseeruddin Shah, Actor<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Brinda Karat, Women&rsquo;s leader, Politician<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Medha Patkar, Activist, politician, women&rsquo;s leader<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shabana Azmi, Actor<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kavitha Kuruganti, Activist, leader of farmer&rsquo;s groups<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nivedita Menon, Academic<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nandita Das, actor<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mukul Kesavan, writer<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Leela Samson, dancer<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ashok Vajpeyi, writer<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Justice Rajinder Sachar, senior jurist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Syeda Hameed, women&rsquo;s leader, former member Planning Commission<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shyam Benegal, filmmaker<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Himanshu Thakkar, environmentalist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Wajahat Habibullah, former Chief Information Commissioner<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Deepak Sandhu, former Chief Information Commissioner<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shailesh Gandhi, former Central Information Commissioner<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Uma Chakravarty, historian<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ritwick Dutta, environmental legal activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Trilochan Shastry, academic<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Jagdeep Chhokar, academic<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Advocate Vrinda Grover<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nandini Sundar, Sociologist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shekhar Singh, RTI activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amar Kanwar, filmmaker<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Prof C.P.Chandrasekhar, labour economist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Dilip Simeon, academic<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Prithvi Sharma, activist, also on behalf of ICAN<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Maja Daruwala, senior human rights activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mathew Cherian, Helpage<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; M. Krishna, Musician, Writer<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Anand Patwardhan, filmmaker<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Lalit Mathur, former civil servant<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kavita Srivastava, PUCL, Rajasthan<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Anjali Bhardwaj, RTI activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Achin Vinayak, academic and activist, Delhi<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ram Rehman, photographer<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Pamela Philipose, journalist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; A.Gandhi , academic<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rita Anand, senior journalist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nirmala Lakshman, senior journalist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Tripurari Sharma, Drama and Theater, playright<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Harsh Sethi, writer<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Madhu Bhaduri, former diplomat<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sharmila Tagore, Actor<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amitabh Mukhopadhyay, former auditor, CAG<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mridula Mukherjee, historian<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Aditya Mukherjee, historian<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amita Baviskar, academic<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Arundhati Dhuru, activist, UP<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kavita Krishnan, activist, leader of women&rsquo;s groups<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Reetika Khera, Economist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sanjay Kak, filmmaker<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Baba Adhav, labour leader<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Achyut Das, activist, Odisha<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ajit Ranade, economist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kalpana Kannabiran, sociologist, lawyer<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vasanth Kannabiran, teacher and activist, Andhra<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Paul Divakar, dalit activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Abha Sur, writer, academic<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rajni Bakshi, writer<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ravi Chopra, activist, Uttarakhand<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Neelabh Mishra, writer<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Poornima Chikarmane, Pune<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Zoya Hasan , academic, political scientist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shabnam Hashmi, activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rebecca John, academic<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Anandalakshmy, academic<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Smita Gupta, Economist, Head of economic cell, AIDWA<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Praveen Jha, Economist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Gautam Navlakha, senior activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Venkatesh Nayak, RTI activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Seema Mustafa, journalist, editor, The Citizen<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Bela Bhatia, academic<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Bezwada Wilson, senior activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Haragopal, academic<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sumit Chakravarty, Editor, Mainstream<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Gargi Chakravarty, Women&rsquo;s activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Patricia Uberoi<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kamal Chenoy, senior academic<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Janaki Nair, academic<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vipul Mudgal, journalist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Deepa Sinha, Right to Food activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Himanshu, activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Uma Pillai, former civil servant<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nikhil Dey, activist, Rajasthan<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; N.Rath, academic<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Abey George,academic<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mahesh Pandya, ICAN<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Jyothi Krishnan, academic<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Balram, activist, Jharkhand<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; AL Rangarajan, ICAN<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rajaram Singh<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rameshwar Prasad, ICAN<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Anand Murugesan, academic<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Abha Bhaiya, women&rsquo;s activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sagar Rabari, activist, Gujarat<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Dhirendhra Singh<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rammanohar Reddy, former editor EPW, senior writer<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nandini K Oza, water activist, Maharasthra<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Osama Manzar, Digital Empowerment Foundation<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rakesh Sharma<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Pankti Jog, RTI activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rakesh Reddy Dubbudu, RTI activist, Telangana<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Subrat Das, economist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Umesh Anand, editor, Civil Society<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Charul,singer, cultural activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vinay, singer, writer, musician, activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Maya Caroli<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ashwini Kulkarni, activist, Pune<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vibha Puri Das<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Surjit Das<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amrita Johri, RTI activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Madhuresh Kumar, activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ankur Sarin<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Dipak Dholakia<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Navdeep Mathur<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Harinesh, activist, Gujarat<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Persis Ginwalla<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shamsul Islam, theatre activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Prafulla Samantara, activist, Odisha<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Lingraj Azad, activist, Odisha<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sunilam, activist, Madhya Pradesh<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Aradhana Bhargava<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Meera Chaudhary, activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Suniti SR, activist, Pune<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Suhas Kolhekar, activist Pune<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Prasad Bagwe<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Gabrielle Dietrich, leader of Women&rsquo;s groups<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Geetha Ramakrishnan, activist Tamil Nadu<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; R. Neelkandan<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; P Chennaiah, activist Telangana<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ramakrishnan Raju, activist, Andhra<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Richa Singh, activist, Uttar Pradesh<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sister Cella<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vimal Bhai, activist, Himachal Pradesh<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Jabar Singh, activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Anand Mazgaonkar<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Krishnakanth<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kamayani Swami, activist, Bihar<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ashish Ranjan, activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mahendra Yadav, activist<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Faisal Khan, activist, Haryana<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; JS Walla<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kailash Meena, activist, Rajasthan<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amitava Mitra<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Aveek Saha<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; BS Rawat<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rajendra Ravi<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shabnam Shaikh<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mahesh Pandya<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; S. Shylendra<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Iqbalkhan Pulli<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Soumen Ray<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ramachandra Prasad, ICAN<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ravi M.<br />
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Dipak Dholakia<br />
<br />
</div>',
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$articleid = (int) 31154
$metaTitle = 'LATEST NEWS UPDATES | Activists, Academics Write Open Letter to PM Modi on the Drought'
$metaKeywords = 'drought,Employment,Livelihood Security,MGNREGS,NREGA,mgnrega,NREGS,Fodder'
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-TheWire.in

According to the central government&rsquo;s statement to the Supreme Court last week, a third of the India&rsquo;s districts are currently facing a severe drought. This means that at least 33 crore Indians are affected by ongoing the crisis.

Expressing their deep...'
$disp = '<div align="justify">-TheWire.in<br /><br /><em>According to the central government&rsquo;s statement to the Supreme Court last week, a third of the India&rsquo;s districts are currently facing a severe drought. This means that at least 33 crore Indians are affected by ongoing the crisis.<br /><br />Expressing their deep concern on the issue and the impact it is having on rural populations of the country, and asking that the government take appropriate relief measures immediately, more than 150 academics and activists have written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi.<br /></em><br />Dear Mr Prime Minister,<br /><br />We wish to convey our deep collective anxiety about the enormous suffering of the rural poor in large parts of India&rsquo;s countryside as they are battling drought, often for the second or even third consecutive year. In areas where rains have failed, farmers who depend mainly on rainwater to irrigate their crops have no or very low crop yields. Those who rely on irrigation are also affected, with groundwater sinking and streams and reservoirs drying up. All this adds to chronic agrarian distress reflected in a massive slowdown in agricultural growth during the last few years, with no imminent signs of recovery.<br /><br />The consequence of this adversity is massive distress movement of populations, causing broken childhoods, interrupted education, life in camps, city pavements or crowded shanties. Add to this the old and the infirm who are left behind, to beg for food or just quietly die. The cattle for whom there is no fodder, sold at distress prices or just abandoned to fend for themselves. And the drying up even of sources of water to drink.<br /><br />However, the response of central and state administrations to looming drought is sadly listless, lacking in both urgency and compassion. The scale of MGNREGA works is way below what is required and wages often remain unpaid for months. Even more gravely, the central and state governments are doing far too little to implement the National Food Security Act, three years after it came into force. Had the Act been in place, more than 80% of rural households in the poorer states would be able to secure about half of their monthly cereal requirements almost free of cost. In a drought situation food security entitlements should be made universal.<br /><br />In addition, we find no plans in most of the drought-hit regions for feeding the destitute, especially old persons left behind when families migrate, children without care-givers, the disabled and other vulnerable groups. ICDS centres could have been upgraded to supply emergency feeding to the destitute during the drought, but this has not happened. Under Supreme Court orders, school meals should be served on all days, including holidays, in drought-affected areas, but this is rarely the case. Arrangements to augment drinking water supply, including ensuring that marginalised hamlets have functioning tube-wells and transporting water where necessary, are awfully inadequate. There are also few attempts to create fodder banks and cattle camps. Most of these measures used to be a routine part of state response to drought, and were often undertaken with a great sense of urgency, but they are barely being considered today.<br /><br />The highest priority of the central government in a drought situation should be to ensure the creation of millions of additional person-days of work in all affected villages. Instead, the government has not even allocated enough funds this year to sustain the level of employment generated last year &ndash; 233 crore person-days according to official data. At current levels of expenditure per person-day, this would cost well over 50,000 crore rupees. Yet the central government has allocated just 38,500 crore rupees to MGNREGA this year, of which more than 12,000 crore rupees are required to clear pending liabilities. These liabilities only prove the distress crores of workers have been put through because of wages left unpaid for months at a time. Unemployment allowance and mandatory compensation for delayed wage payments are also not paid, citing &ldquo;insufficient funds&rdquo;, resulting in a failure of the Act, and its legal safeguards. Most alarming today, is that instead of expanding, MGNREGA is all set to contract in this critical drought year, unless financial allocations are vastly expanded.<br /><br />The enormous distress &ndash; of food, drinking water, work, fodder for animals, and dignity &ndash; of hundred of millions is utterly unacceptable. We demand that the central government under your leadership acknowledges these failures and makes rapid amends, by implementing all the traditional relief measures as well as by ensuring full implementation of the National Food Security Act 2013 and the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act 2005 in letter and spirit.<br /><br />Signed &ndash;<br /><br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Aruna Roy, senior activist, Rajasthan<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Jean Dreze, Economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Jayati Ghosh, Economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Harsh Mander, Activist, Writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Satish Deshpande, Academic, Sociologist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Deep Joshi, senior environmentalist and water activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Prabhat Patnaik, Professor Emeritus, Economist, Senior academician<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amit Bhaduri, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vijay Vyas, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Utsa Patnaik, Professor and Senior Economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Arundhati Roy, Writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Admiral Ramdas, former Chief of Naval Staff<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Lalita Ramdas, activist, Maharashtra<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Naseeruddin Shah, Actor<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Brinda Karat, Women&rsquo;s leader, Politician<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Medha Patkar, Activist, politician, women&rsquo;s leader<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shabana Azmi, Actor<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kavitha Kuruganti, Activist, leader of farmer&rsquo;s groups<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nivedita Menon, Academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nandita Das, actor<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mukul Kesavan, writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Leela Samson, dancer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ashok Vajpeyi, writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Justice Rajinder Sachar, senior jurist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Syeda Hameed, women&rsquo;s leader, former member Planning Commission<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shyam Benegal, filmmaker<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Himanshu Thakkar, environmentalist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Wajahat Habibullah, former Chief Information Commissioner<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Deepak Sandhu, former Chief Information Commissioner<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shailesh Gandhi, former Central Information Commissioner<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Uma Chakravarty, historian<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ritwick Dutta, environmental legal activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Trilochan Shastry, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Jagdeep Chhokar, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Advocate Vrinda Grover<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nandini Sundar, Sociologist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shekhar Singh, RTI activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amar Kanwar, filmmaker<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Prof C.P.Chandrasekhar, labour economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Dilip Simeon, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Prithvi Sharma, activist, also on behalf of ICAN<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Maja Daruwala, senior human rights activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mathew Cherian, Helpage<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; M. Krishna, Musician, Writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Anand Patwardhan, filmmaker<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Lalit Mathur, former civil servant<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kavita Srivastava, PUCL, Rajasthan<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Anjali Bhardwaj, RTI activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Achin Vinayak, academic and activist, Delhi<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ram Rehman, photographer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Pamela Philipose, journalist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; A.Gandhi , academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rita Anand, senior journalist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nirmala Lakshman, senior journalist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Tripurari Sharma, Drama and Theater, playright<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Harsh Sethi, writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Madhu Bhaduri, former diplomat<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sharmila Tagore, Actor<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amitabh Mukhopadhyay, former auditor, CAG<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mridula Mukherjee, historian<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Aditya Mukherjee, historian<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amita Baviskar, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Arundhati Dhuru, activist, UP<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kavita Krishnan, activist, leader of women&rsquo;s groups<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Reetika Khera, Economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sanjay Kak, filmmaker<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Baba Adhav, labour leader<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Achyut Das, activist, Odisha<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ajit Ranade, economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kalpana Kannabiran, sociologist, lawyer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vasanth Kannabiran, teacher and activist, Andhra<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Paul Divakar, dalit activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Abha Sur, writer, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rajni Bakshi, writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ravi Chopra, activist, Uttarakhand<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Neelabh Mishra, writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Poornima Chikarmane, Pune<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Zoya Hasan , academic, political scientist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shabnam Hashmi, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rebecca John, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Anandalakshmy, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Smita Gupta, Economist, Head of economic cell, AIDWA<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Praveen Jha, Economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Gautam Navlakha, senior activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Venkatesh Nayak, RTI activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Seema Mustafa, journalist, editor, The Citizen<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Bela Bhatia, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Bezwada Wilson, senior activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Haragopal, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sumit Chakravarty, Editor, Mainstream<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Gargi Chakravarty, Women&rsquo;s activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Patricia Uberoi<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kamal Chenoy, senior academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Janaki Nair, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vipul Mudgal, journalist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Deepa Sinha, Right to Food activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Himanshu, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Uma Pillai, former civil servant<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nikhil Dey, activist, Rajasthan<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; N.Rath, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Abey George,academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mahesh Pandya, ICAN<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Jyothi Krishnan, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Balram, activist, Jharkhand<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; AL Rangarajan, ICAN<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rajaram Singh<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rameshwar Prasad, ICAN<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Anand Murugesan, academic<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Abha Bhaiya, women&rsquo;s activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sagar Rabari, activist, Gujarat<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Dhirendhra Singh<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rammanohar Reddy, former editor EPW, senior writer<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nandini K Oza, water activist, Maharasthra<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Osama Manzar, Digital Empowerment Foundation<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rakesh Sharma<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Pankti Jog, RTI activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rakesh Reddy Dubbudu, RTI activist, Telangana<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Subrat Das, economist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Umesh Anand, editor, Civil Society<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Charul,singer, cultural activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vinay, singer, writer, musician, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Maya Caroli<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ashwini Kulkarni, activist, Pune<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vibha Puri Das<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Surjit Das<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amrita Johri, RTI activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Madhuresh Kumar, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ankur Sarin<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Dipak Dholakia<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Navdeep Mathur<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Harinesh, activist, Gujarat<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Persis Ginwalla<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shamsul Islam, theatre activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Prafulla Samantara, activist, Odisha<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Lingraj Azad, activist, Odisha<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sunilam, activist, Madhya Pradesh<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Aradhana Bhargava<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Meera Chaudhary, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Suniti SR, activist, Pune<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Suhas Kolhekar, activist Pune<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Prasad Bagwe<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Gabrielle Dietrich, leader of Women&rsquo;s groups<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Geetha Ramakrishnan, activist Tamil Nadu<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; R. Neelkandan<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; P Chennaiah, activist Telangana<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ramakrishnan Raju, activist, Andhra<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Richa Singh, activist, Uttar Pradesh<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sister Cella<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Vimal Bhai, activist, Himachal Pradesh<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Jabar Singh, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Anand Mazgaonkar<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Krishnakanth<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kamayani Swami, activist, Bihar<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ashish Ranjan, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mahendra Yadav, activist<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Faisal Khan, activist, Haryana<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; JS Walla<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Kailash Meena, activist, Rajasthan<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Amitava Mitra<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Aveek Saha<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; BS Rawat<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Rajendra Ravi<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Shabnam Shaikh<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Mahesh Pandya<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; S. Shylendra<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Iqbalkhan Pulli<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Soumen Ray<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ramachandra Prasad, ICAN<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Ravi M.<br />&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Dipak Dholakia<br /><br /></div>'
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Cake\Controller\Controller::render() - CORE/src/Controller/Controller.php, line 791
Cake\Http\ActionDispatcher::_invoke() - CORE/src/Http/ActionDispatcher.php, line 126
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Activists, Academics Write Open Letter to PM Modi on the Drought

-TheWire.in According to the central government’s statement to the Supreme Court last week, a third of the India’s districts are currently facing a severe drought. This means that at least 33 crore Indians are affected by ongoing the crisis. Expressing their deep concern on the issue and the impact it is having on rural populations of the country, and asking that the government take appropriate relief measures immediately, more than 150 academics and activists have written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Dear Mr Prime Minister, We wish to convey our deep collective anxiety about the enormous suffering of the rural poor in large parts of India’s countryside as they are battling drought, often for the second or even third consecutive year. In areas where rains have failed, farmers who depend mainly on rainwater to irrigate their crops have no or very low crop yields. Those who rely on irrigation are also affected, with groundwater sinking and streams and reservoirs drying up. All this adds to chronic agrarian distress reflected in a massive slowdown in agricultural growth during the last few years, with no imminent signs of recovery. The consequence of this adversity is massive distress movement of populations, causing broken childhoods, interrupted education, life in camps, city pavements or crowded shanties. Add to this the old and the infirm who are left behind, to beg for food or just quietly die. The cattle for whom there is no fodder, sold at distress prices or just abandoned to fend for themselves. And the drying up even of sources of water to drink. However, the response of central and state administrations to looming drought is sadly listless, lacking in both urgency and compassion. The scale of MGNREGA works is way below what is required and wages often remain unpaid for months. Even more gravely, the central and state governments are doing far too little to implement the National Food Security Act, three years after it came into force. Had the Act been in place, more than 80% of rural households in the poorer states would be able to secure about half of their monthly cereal requirements almost free of cost. In a drought situation food security entitlements should be made universal. In addition, we find no plans in most of the drought-hit regions for feeding the destitute, especially old persons left behind when families migrate, children without care-givers, the disabled and other vulnerable groups. ICDS centres could have been upgraded to supply emergency feeding to the destitute during the drought, but this has not happened. Under Supreme Court orders, school meals should be served on all days, including holidays, in drought-affected areas, but this is rarely the case. Arrangements to augment drinking water supply, including ensuring that marginalised hamlets have functioning tube-wells and transporting water where necessary, are awfully inadequate. There are also few attempts to create fodder banks and cattle camps. Most of these measures used to be a routine part of state response to drought, and were often undertaken with a great sense of urgency, but they are barely being considered today. The highest priority of the central government in a drought situation should be to ensure the creation of millions of additional person-days of work in all affected villages. Instead, the government has not even allocated enough funds this year to sustain the level of employment generated last year – 233 crore person-days according to official data. At current levels of expenditure per person-day, this would cost well over 50,000 crore rupees. Yet the central government has allocated just 38,500 crore rupees to MGNREGA this year, of which more than 12,000 crore rupees are required to clear pending liabilities. These liabilities only prove the distress crores of workers have been put through because of wages left unpaid for months at a time. Unemployment allowance and mandatory compensation for delayed wage payments are also not paid, citing “insufficient funds”, resulting in a failure of the Act, and its legal safeguards. Most alarming today, is that instead of expanding, MGNREGA is all set to contract in this critical drought year, unless financial allocations are vastly expanded. The enormous distress – of food, drinking water, work, fodder for animals, and dignity – of hundred of millions is utterly unacceptable. We demand that the central government under your leadership acknowledges these failures and makes rapid amends, by implementing all the traditional relief measures as well as by ensuring full implementation of the National Food Security Act 2013 and the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act 2005 in letter and spirit. Signed –     Aruna Roy, senior activist, Rajasthan     Jean Dreze, Economist     Jayati Ghosh, Economist     Harsh Mander, Activist, Writer     Satish Deshpande, Academic, Sociologist     Deep Joshi, senior environmentalist and water activist     Prabhat Patnaik, Professor Emeritus, Economist, Senior academician     Amit Bhaduri, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist     Vijay Vyas, Professor Emeritus, Senior Economist     Utsa Patnaik, Professor and Senior Economist     Arundhati Roy, Writer     Admiral Ramdas, former Chief of Naval Staff     Lalita Ramdas, activist, Maharashtra     Naseeruddin Shah, Actor     Brinda Karat, Women’s leader, Politician     Medha Patkar, Activist, politician, women’s leader     Shabana Azmi, Actor     Kavitha Kuruganti, Activist, leader of farmer’s groups     Nivedita Menon, Academic     Nandita Das, actor     Mukul Kesavan, writer     Leela Samson, dancer     Ashok Vajpeyi, writer     Justice Rajinder Sachar, senior jurist     Syeda Hameed, women’s leader, former member Planning Commission     Shyam Benegal, filmmaker     Himanshu Thakkar, environmentalist     Wajahat Habibullah, former Chief Information Commissioner     Deepak Sandhu, former Chief Information Commissioner     Shailesh Gandhi, former Central Information Commissioner     Uma Chakravarty, historian     Ritwick Dutta, environmental legal activist     Trilochan Shastry, academic     Jagdeep Chhokar, academic     Advocate Vrinda Grover     Nandini Sundar, Sociologist     Shekhar Singh, RTI activist     Amar Kanwar, filmmaker     Prof C.P.Chandrasekhar, labour economist     Dilip Simeon, academic     Prithvi Sharma, activist, also on behalf of ICAN     Maja Daruwala, senior human rights activist     Mathew Cherian, Helpage     M. Krishna, Musician, Writer     Anand Patwardhan, filmmaker     Lalit Mathur, former civil servant     Kavita Srivastava, PUCL, Rajasthan     Anjali Bhardwaj, RTI activist     Achin Vinayak, academic and activist, Delhi     Ram Rehman, photographer     Pamela Philipose, journalist     A.Gandhi , academic     Rita Anand, senior journalist     Nirmala Lakshman, senior journalist     Tripurari Sharma, Drama and Theater, playright     Harsh Sethi, writer     Madhu Bhaduri, former diplomat     Sharmila Tagore, Actor     Amitabh Mukhopadhyay, former auditor, CAG     Mridula Mukherjee, historian     Aditya Mukherjee, historian     Amita Baviskar, academic     Arundhati Dhuru, activist, UP     Kavita Krishnan, activist, leader of women’s groups     Reetika Khera, Economist     Sanjay Kak, filmmaker     Baba Adhav, labour leader     Achyut Das, activist, Odisha     Ajit Ranade, economist     Kalpana Kannabiran, sociologist, lawyer     Vasanth Kannabiran, teacher and activist, Andhra     Paul Divakar, dalit activist     Abha Sur, writer, academic     Rajni Bakshi, writer     Ravi Chopra, activist, Uttarakhand     Neelabh Mishra, writer     Poornima Chikarmane, Pune     Zoya Hasan , academic, political scientist     Shabnam Hashmi, activist     Rebecca John, academic     Anandalakshmy, academic     Smita Gupta, Economist, Head of economic cell, AIDWA     Praveen Jha, Economist     Gautam Navlakha, senior activist     Venkatesh Nayak, RTI activist     Seema Mustafa, journalist, editor, The Citizen     Bela Bhatia, academic     Bezwada Wilson, senior activist     Haragopal, academic     Sumit Chakravarty, Editor, Mainstream     Gargi Chakravarty, Women’s activist     Patricia Uberoi     Kamal Chenoy, senior academic     Janaki Nair, academic     Vipul Mudgal, journalist     Deepa Sinha, Right to Food activist     Himanshu, activist     Uma Pillai, former civil servant     Nikhil Dey, activist, Rajasthan     N.Rath, academic     Abey George,academic     Mahesh Pandya, ICAN     Jyothi Krishnan, academic     Balram, activist, Jharkhand     AL Rangarajan, ICAN     Rajaram Singh     Rameshwar Prasad, ICAN     Anand Murugesan, academic     Abha Bhaiya, women’s activist     Sagar Rabari, activist, Gujarat     Dhirendhra Singh     Rammanohar Reddy, former editor EPW, senior writer     Nandini K Oza, water activist, Maharasthra     Osama Manzar, Digital Empowerment Foundation     Rakesh Sharma     Pankti Jog, RTI activist     Rakesh Reddy Dubbudu, RTI activist, Telangana     Subrat Das, economist     Umesh Anand, editor, Civil Society     Charul,singer, cultural activist     Vinay, singer, writer, musician, activist     Maya Caroli     Ashwini Kulkarni, activist, Pune     Vibha Puri Das     Surjit Das     Amrita Johri, RTI activist     Madhuresh Kumar, activist     Ankur Sarin     Dipak Dholakia     Navdeep Mathur     Harinesh, activist, Gujarat     Persis Ginwalla     Shamsul Islam, theatre activist     Prafulla Samantara, activist, Odisha     Lingraj Azad, activist, Odisha     Sunilam, activist, Madhya Pradesh     Aradhana Bhargava     Meera Chaudhary, activist     Suniti SR, activist, Pune     Suhas Kolhekar, activist Pune     Prasad Bagwe     Gabrielle Dietrich, leader of Women’s groups     Geetha Ramakrishnan, activist Tamil Nadu     R. Neelkandan     P Chennaiah, activist Telangana     Ramakrishnan Raju, activist, Andhra     Richa Singh, activist, Uttar Pradesh     Sister Cella     Vimal Bhai, activist, Himachal Pradesh     Jabar Singh, activist     Anand Mazgaonkar     Krishnakanth     Kamayani Swami, activist, Bihar     Ashish Ranjan, activist     Mahendra Yadav, activist     Faisal Khan, activist, Haryana     JS Walla     Kailash Meena, activist, Rajasthan     Amitava Mitra     Aveek Saha     BS Rawat     Rajendra Ravi     Shabnam Shaikh     Mahesh Pandya     S. Shylendra     Iqbalkhan Pulli     Soumen Ray     Ramachandra Prasad, ICAN     Ravi M.     Dipak Dholakia