-Down to Earth The nomadic pastoral communities cannot afford to remain in their houses even during a pandemic The second wave of the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic has ravaged livelihoods of people in urban areas. Its has now quietly started to wreak havoc on the lives of people in rural areas. Across the country, villagers are brushing off symptoms of COVID-19 as seasonal flu. The crumbling health infrastructure fails to provide them...

-The Hindu Advent of pandemic caused long delays at every stage, says Rural Development Ministry Less than 6% of houses sanctioned under the Centre’s flagship rural housing scheme in 2020-21 have reached completion so far this year, with COVID-19 stalling progress, the Rural Development Ministry told a Parliamentary Standing Committee last month. However, some States such as Odisha and Jharkhand used the scheme to provide employment opportunities for migrant workers who returned...

-OpenTheMagazine.com From working to make Kutch villages self-sufficient to investing in traditional practices in the Himalayas to digging wells in Bengaluru, India’s frontline fighters are making water scarcity a thing of the past GAZALA PAUL, 56 AHMEDABAD: MAKING VILLAGES SELF-SUFFICIENT “If I can save water at the individual level by using water sparingly and not allowing others to waste, that is the beginning,” says Gazala Paul. But she has been doing much more...

-Newslaundry.com Journalist Paranjoy Guha Thakurta faces arrest for an article on the Adani Group, comedian Munawar Faruqui languishes in jail. The good news we were all waiting for in these bleak times came with India’s sensational win in the cricket test series against Australia in Brisbane on January 19. But even as we celebrated good times for Indian cricket, the bad times for Indian journalism and freedom of speech and expression continued. On...

-Newslaundry.com A Gujarat court has issued an arrest warrant for the seasoned journalist after suddenly reviving a defamation case filed by the Adani Group over three years ago. On January 11, a court in Kutch, Gujarat, issued an arrest warrant for journalist and author Paranjoy Guha Thakurta in a defamation suit filed by the Adani Group, one of India’s leading corporate houses. According to PTI, judicial magistrate Pradeep Soni pronounced that Thakurta was...