-The Times of India Though El Nino concerns still loom large over the coming month, August has been wetter than expected. Rains in the last 16 days have lashed the parched fields of most parts of the country, especially the northern and western parts which were reeling under acute rain deficiency. More rains have recharged depleted reservoirs. Water level in 84 main reservoirs is at 51% of the full reservoir level, equalling...

-IANS At least 2,000 people were taken to safer places after the Hati river in Odisha's Kalahandi district overflowed Sunday due to heavy rainfall during the last three days, an official said. Mihir Mohanty, an officer of the state disaster management department, told IANS that those moved to safer places from the low-laying areas were being provided dry and cooked food. The river was flowing two feet above the danger mark at Junagarh...

-The Times of India It was a rainy July evening ten years ago. A motley group of villagers from Sutia gathered at the local market to protest the spate of rapes that had left the area terrorized. They were angry but terrified of reprisal. And they did not know if anyone would join the fight. Speaking in hushed tones, they distributed leaflets asking people to join the protest. Some took the...

-The Telegraph Weather scientists today predicted two weeks of active monsoon coming up but cautioned that without steady excess rainfall over the next eight weeks, the prospects of a normal monsoon this year will recede. Atmospheric conditions now appear favourable for two weeks of good rainfall across peninsular, central and northern India, but the activity is unlikely to be driven by typical monsoon season mechanisms such as depressions in the Bay of...

-IANS The spectre of drought is looming large over Bihar, something that state officials have acknowledged. "If the monsoon fails the state in the first two weeks of July, the situation may be near drought," an official here said. Monsoon normally hits the state between June 12 and June 14. But this year, it was delayed by over a week. Soon after the rains began, they have been scanty. The state has received...