The Yamuna may be in spate near Delhi, states like Punjab, Haryana, Gujarat, Kerala and Tamil Nadu may be soaked wet and the Mithi river -- the lifeline of Mumbai -- could be flowing at the brim, but for people in the East and Northeast India the thirst for rain prolongs. They wait for the rain gods to smile upon them. Overall, this is one of the best monsoon India has...

There’s suddenly a flurry of activity in Karotia, a nondescript village in West Bengal’s Burdwan district. Lately, a lot of politicians and state government officials have been visiting the village, and they say work on a nearly forgotten 14km irrigation canal is going to start soon. It’s been nearly 36 years since the state government first proposed to dig the canal, recalls Azizur Haque, the local panchayat chief. It was to...

Bolangir district in Orissa, facing drought conditions since 1965, sees an annual mass migration of farmers to other States in search of work. SURESH GOHIR of Bhotapada village in the backward Bolangir district of Orissa consumed pesticide two years ago after his paddy crop failed. He survived the suicide attempt but found life doubly difficult as debt had mounted. Suresh was forced to migrate to neighbouring Andhra Pradesh in search of...

Farmers in the state, already reeling from the impact of a drought that has stalked them for the last two years, now have to prove their “authenticity” to reap the benefits of a crop insurance policy they registered for in 2009. The near-impossible task of checking the veracity of each and every claim, which run into lakhs, will have to be completed before August 31 by the respective district administrations, delaying...

At a time when some of the poorest belts of India are suffering from a Monsoon Failure the government, has decided to let lakhs of tonnes of food grain turn inedible in the godowns rather than give it to the needy. Ironically, it has used the proposed National Food Security Act as an excuse to not distribute the grains to the needy. The Supreme Court in its last hearing had...