-The Indian Express We can add millions of hectares to irrigated land without building a single new dam. We just need to adopt a different method of managing the water already stored in them. One of the drivers of India’s irrigation sector has been the construction of large dams on our rivers, which Jawaharlal Nehru famously described as “the temples of modern India”. While these dams have helped increase India’s irrigated...

-Tehelka Last year’s Red Fort rhetoric has not been matched by action on the ground, with separate toilets for students remaining elusive as ever One part of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s speech on Independence Day this year can safely be predicted: the reeling out of statistics to prove that the Swachh Bharat campaign is sweeping the nation. The cleanliness drive launched on 2 October, 2014, was announced from the ramparts of the...

-DNA Narendra Modi's Swachh Bharat Mission has not only failed at his constituency, Varanasi but also in the nation's capital, Delhi. Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Swachh Bharat campaign that started a year back hasn't achieved desired goals yet.  In a recent assessment on cleanliness carried out by Union Urban Development Ministry, Modi's own constituency, Varanasi ranked 418 on a list of 476 cities.  Meanwhile, the capital is also on the bottom of the list....

-The Telegraph New Delhi: Overall, the south has done best, with 39 among the top 100, followed by 27 from the east, 15 from the west, 12 from the north and 7 from the Northeast. Of the 27 state capitals surveyed, 15 have made it to the top 100 while five have ranked below 300. Bangalore leads the list of capitals, while Patna comes last at 429. Among the other major eastern...

-The Times of India HYDERABAD: Telangana appears to be heading towards a drought. Half of the monsoon season is over and apart from the initial days of rainfall, the state has had a dry spell. Water levels in reservoirs are dropping rapidly and many towns are facing a drinking water crisis. In rural areas, the crisis is in the form of dying crops and a looming threat of fodder shortage. In fact,...