-Down to Earth The report emphasises the need to normalise menstruation by looking at behaviour, infrastructure, politics and perception In an aim to make India open defecation-free by 2019, many aspects of sanitation have been undermined, such as usage, maintenance and water availability. A 2015 report by Dasra, a Mumbai-based philanthropy foundation and the Bank of America highlights another key aspect ignored when it comes to sanitation. According to the report based on data...

-Hindustan Times In 3 years, the Agarwals have prevented the land from being damaged five times Mumbai: Refraining from the usual practice of blaming authorities for destruction of mangroves and wetlands in Mumbai Metropolitan Region, this Navi Mumbai couple felt obligated to make a change. For the last three years, Sunil Agarwal, 55, and his wife Shruti, 50, residents of NRI Complex in Nerul, Navi Mumbai, have been guarding an 80-hectare wetland...

-The Hindu District Collector in Kerala breathes new life into the Karimaramthodu Pathanamthitta (Kerala): A nearly dead natural stream in Kerala has been nursed back to life by a District Collector, who believes that “there is a stream flowing through everyone’s life.” No one imagined that Karimaramthodu, which at one time flowed vigorously around the paddy fields of Aranmula Puncha, could be salvaged after it was filled up for a private airport project. Their...

-The Indian Express Pesticide Management Bill should address the anomalies that prevent state governments from booking large pesticide companies. “Until lions have their own historians, tales of the hunt shall always glorify the hunter,” goes an old African proverb, which is also apt to describe the state of the world’s farmers. Farmers are like the hunted lions who need their side of the story told and their sacrifices, agony, courage and fears...

-The Economic Times A rise of just 2 degrees Celsius in global warming could make over a quarter of the world's land to become drier and more desert like, increasing the threat of widespread drought and wildfires, new research led by one of Indian origin has found. The study showed that reducing greenhouse gas emissions into the atmosphere to limit global warming under 1.5 or 2 degrees Celsius would dramatically reduce the...