-The Telegraph 15 such banks have been opened in Vijayapura district Vijayapura (Karnataka): In times of Drought, cattle drive to a goshala (cattle shed) to feed them and driving them back may prove cumbersome. That explains the reason for the declining demand for goshalas in some of the Drought-affected districts in the State. If the developments in the Drought-affected districts are of any indication, the goshala concept seems to be becoming redundant...

-Business Standard Private weather forecast agency revises estimate to 109% of LPA As the country awaits the arrival of the southwest monsoon after two years of Drought, private weather forecasting agency Skymet on Tuesday revised upward its 2016 southwest monsoon forecast to 109 per cent of the long period average (LPA) from 105 predicted in April. The forecast, if accurate, would mean that India might have its highest southwest monsoon since 1994 and...

-The Financial Express Dismantling cane economy will not be painless, shift crop to drip irrigation Opinion-makers, from agricultural economists and academics to environmentalists, have blamed sugarcane for aggravating the water shortage in Marathwada. But the view is contested. ‘I reject the hypothesis,’ says Venkat Mayande, during a conversation in Pune. Mayande was vice-chancellor of Akola’s Panjabrao Deshmukh Agricultural University till 2012. How can 2.1 lakh hectare (ha) of cane cause a shortage of...

-The Hindu This could cause monsoon to spill over to October: Officials Australia’s weather bureau said the withering El Nino — among the strongest in history and responsible for two years of consecutive Droughts and record summer temperatures in India — had ended. While that bodes well for the monsoon, weather officials in India said this could also be a precursor to floods during August and September and monsoon possibly spilling over...

-The Times of India JAIPUR: A group of activists have written to finance minister Arun Jaitley and rural development minister Chaudhary Birender Singh seeking that they pay heed to the Supreme Court order regarding the proper implementation of MGNREGS (Mahatma Gandhi Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme), which could go a long way in easing the plight of the Drought-affected. In the letter dated May 23, the activists referred to the SC order of...