-The Indian Express The bench also issued directives for updating the drought management manual - published in 2009 — after taking into account rainfall deficit, timely declaration of drought and other factors. New Delhi: RULING THAT “the buck will eventually stop with the Government of India”, the Supreme Court Wednesday directed the Centre to consider drought as a disaster and constitute a national response force along with a consolidated fund within...

-NDTV Solapur: As thousands of villages in the country come under the grip of drought, the role of the government's flagship work guarantee scheme, NREGA or National Rural Employment Guarantee Act, becomes crucial. In January, the Union government told the Supreme Court  that for all drought-hit states, NREGA's 100-day limit has been increased to 150 days. But travelling this week through Marathwada in Maharashtra, the country's drought central, in village after village we...

-The Hindu Business Line The only way this story of the Indian farmer will change is if policymakers ensure better remuneration for them The peasant (in India) is born in debt, lives in debt, dies in debt and bequeaths debt. This is what Sir Malcolm Darling, a famous British researcher and writer, wrote in 1925 after studying the condition of undivided Punjab’s peasants. Had Darling been alive today he would have rephrased his...

-Livemint.com Automobile, construction industry, steel manufacturing, pharmaceuticals, breweries, and distilleries key sectors in Marathwada. Latur is major centre for production of pulses, oilseeds Latur, Maharashtra: Nilesh Thakkar, managing director of Maharashtra Biofertilizers India Pvt. Ltd (MBF), has virtually turned the Latur headquarters of India’s top organic fertilizer company into a campaign office. This is the office from where he runs Jalyukt Latur, a public campaign to revive the Manjra River nearby. And Thakkar...

-The Tribune Punjabi farmer grows coriander and reaps handsome profit Chandigarh: Alambir Singh Randhawa (62), a resident of Chandigarh and owner of 160 acres in Sagar district of the drought-hit Madhya Pradesh, had never seen the Betwa river in the region bone dry. The river-fed irrigation system of the state had failed. With no proper rain since August 2015, he along with other farmers was staring at another season of loss but playing...