-The Hindu Ahmedabad: With less than normal monsoon this year, Gujarat is set to face a major water crisis in Summer as most of the dams and reservoirs in the State have less than 50 per cent storage. Chief Minister Anandiben Patel has already declared that the farmers should not demand water for irrigation this year as the available water will be used only for drinking. Except the Narmada dam in south...

-Hindustan Times Wheat, the country’s winter staple, has hit hurdles, with farmers unable to sow the normal area and instances of a dreaded fungus attack being reported from some parts of Punjab and Haryana, raising concerns of a lower output. Summer foodgrain output fell 1.7% at 124.05 million tonne, according to the government’s first of the four quarterly estimates due to a crippling back-to-back drought. This has hurt farm incomes, which support...

-India Today West Bengal: "Kerosene is sold at Rs 40 per litre in the market. Now the money will be saved, thanks to the solar lamps. We are really grateful to the solar aid," said Kasinath Mahata, one of the villagers. It was celebration time for the people of Pandri, a village in the Purulia district of West Bengal, illuminated with lightening after years of hassle. The excitement doubled when the village...

-The Indian Express   The odd-even car proposal is being enforced in Delhi without any evidence or cost-benefit analysis    Mahatma Gandhi had said, “Action in the absence of knowledge can be dangerous and worse than no action at all”. This sage advice is ignored by most Indians. In the face of a serious pollution problem prevalent in most Indian cities, especially the smaller towns, we pretend that it is only the people...

-The Telegraph New Delhi: India's traditionally wet northeastern region has experienced a higher frequency of drought than arid western India over the past 15 years, researchers have said, cautioning that this trend has implications for crop productivity in the region. An analysis of the Summer monsoon rainfall since 2000 has shown that the probability of drought was 54 per cent in the northeastern region and 27 per cent in the traditionally arid...