-Livemint.com Despite improvements over the past few years, accessing clean water is a big challenge in rural India Women in Indian villages have borne the brunt of water scarcity for a long time. Tales of young women missing out on school or college to fetch water for their families are common across the Indian countryside even today. But then there are extreme examples, such as the village of Denganmal, 150 kilometres...

-Business Standard A clear picture is likely to emerge only towards the end of June Mumbai: Rural distress owing to heavy unseasonal rains in March and the prospects of less-than-normal monsoon have made bankers “a cautious lot” at the start of this financial year. However, it is too early to conclude that the impact of rains, or the lack of it, would be bad. According to public sector bank executives, the assessment for...

-Livemint.com The challenge of employment may be the next big crisis that the government may have to face Two of the burning issues currently dominating the public discourse are the amendments to the land acquisition bill proposed by the National Democratic Alliance and the ongoing crisis in agriculture. At the centre of all this is the Indian farmer, who, on the one hand, is struggling to save his land from draconian amendments to...

-The Telegraph New Delhi: A network of 293 ground motion sensors located across northern, eastern and northeastern India lay crippled during Nepal's 7.9 magnitude earthquake and its aftershocks, handicapping researchers trying to assess how the quakes affected cities and towns in these regions. No one knows how many of the 293 sensors designed to measure ground acceleration during earthquakes were actually recording data during the weekend earthquakes because funding for maintenance of...

-The World Bank A World Bank study shows creating productive assets can help make MGNREGS cost effective New Delhi– The Indian economy has turned the corner, says the latest India Development Update of the World Bank. Aided by a supportive external environment, in particular the sharp decline in oil and commodity prices, the Indian economy has taken strong strides towards higher growth and enhanced stability. Growth has accelerated, inflation has declined, the...