-India Spend/ Scroll.in In August, the CAG found that the National Rural Drinking Water Programme had failed to meet its targets. More than 163 million Indians – higher than the population of Russia – do not have access to safe drinking water, and the National Rural Drinking Water Programme, despite spending 90% of Rs 89,956 crore budget over five years to 2017, has “failed” its targets, according to an August 2018 report...

-IndiaWaterPortal.org The latest addition to India’s interstate river water conflicts, the Mahanadi will soon go water deficit if Odisha and Chhattisgarh don’t control their hunger for coal-fired power. A new study, Mahanadi: Coal Rich, Water-Stressed sheds light on how both Odisha and Chhattisgarh have locked horns over the distribution of waters of the Mahanadi river. The 851-km-long river originates in the Dhamtari district of Chhattisgarh, flows through the state and then...

-Newsclick.in Unbridled exploitation of workers under the supervision of BJP governments has led to widespread anger and discontent, which is likely to be reflected in the Assembly polls. While Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan are gearing up for Assembly elections, the two BJP-ruled states have also been at the forefront of actively overseeing the worsening  condition of industrial workers. Besides administering meagre rates of minimum wage, the two states have introduced a slew of...

-Newsclick.in A combination of fund squeeze and political aversion has deprived lakhs of people from getting MGNREGS work, even though wages are very low. As the job crisis rages unabated across the country, demand for work under the rural jobs guarantee programme (MGNREGS – Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act) has risen dramatically in the past few years. In Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan, the two big states where polling for Assembly...

-Financial Express Implementation of farm loan waivers by various State Governments has led to a sharp decline in both the number of insurance policies and the farm area insured under the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana (PMFBY). According to data gathered by FE, during kharif 2018 (the harvesting of the crop is on), the number of insured loanee farmers under PMFBY was just over 2 crore, compared with 3 crore such...