Panchayati Raj Institutions

Featured Articles
April 6, 2021 Significantly reduced the daily drudgery of women in rural areas
The water requirement for the scheme is being fulfilled through borings, submersible pumps, and distribution pipelines implemented by the Department of Panchayati Raj, Government of Bihar. (Image: Sehgal Foundation)
December 7, 2020 The new farm related bills will spell doom for women workers who form the bulk of small and marginal sections of Indian agriculture, warns Mahila Kisan Adhikaar Manch (MAKAAM).
Farm women, overworked and underpaid (Image Source: India Water Portal)
October 24, 2019 An intern with Watershed Organisation Trust narrates his field experience from the villages of Madhya Pradesh, where farmers are using farm ponds to conserve water.
A farm pond constructed by Sheshrao Dhurve in Karaghat Kamti village of Madhya Pradesh
October 22, 2019 A forum discusses the need to stop illegal land transfers and land alienation of the poor.
The maldharis from kutch on their own road trip (Image: Malay Maniar, Flickr Commons, CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)
October 21, 2019 In this interview, Joy talks about his work as an activist working in rural Maharashtra, and how he came to work on water conflicts in India.
KJ Joy speaks at a felicitation for the late Professor Ramaswamy Iyer.
September 30, 2019 The recently concluded 4 day conference in Bangalore looked at the current state of global water resource challenges & future pathways to achieve the SDGs, while ensuring equity in access to all.
Charles Vorosmarty, Chair, COMPASS Initiative, Water Future at the opening plenary on advanced water system assessments to address water security challenges of the 21st century.
In-house experts: the barefoot hydrogeologists of the Himalayan regions
A nation-wide effort to create a cadre of people with a sound understanding of their local geology and groundwater is resulting in people who know the rocks beneath as well as they know their fields! Posted on 05 Jun, 2014 03:46 PM

The fourteen women and three men were rapt as Pan-'da' explained the intricacies of Himalayan geology. Every now and then, a question would be asked. Pan-'da' would then create an impromptu geological model using a notebook or a whiteboard eraser to explain the concepts. This was essential because the audience had no prior background in geology. Only some of them were even literate.

Pan Singh explains the use of a clinometer
Open Happiness' or open a can of worms?
Nandlal Master has been waging a decade-long struggle against the many injustices carried out by the Coca Cola factory in Mehdiganj, Uttar Pradesh. Listen to his story. Posted on 16 May, 2014 08:11 PM

1999 was an interesting real estate year for Mehdiganj village in Uttar Pradesh. Someone began buying up land adjoining a soft drink factory owned by the Parle Company. They also began buying land from the farmers except the farmers had no idea as to whom they were selling the land to. As the boundary wall rose up, problems arose too.

Nandlal Master - fighting Coca Cola since 2002
Ancient engineering marvels of Tamil Nadu
Eris, a system of cascading tanks, were once completely managed by local communities. With centralisation came disuse and lack of maintenance but an organisation is working to revive them. Posted on 05 Apr, 2014 02:06 PM

South India has a rich tradition of tanks with the three southern states of Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh contributing to close to 92% of the total irrigation by tanks in the 1970s. Two decades later, this number dwindled to close to 53%. A decade after that, in 2001, the total contribution of tank irrigation in all of India was estimated to be just around 5.18%.

Small tank near Thalambedu in Kanchipuram
A pathway for water
Pophala, a village that was dry land farming in Aurangabad, channeled the rainwater it harvested by way of trenches. The drinking water wells are now full and their crop variety has increased. Posted on 25 Mar, 2014 08:18 PM

Pophala is a dry land farming village with 73 families that cultivate 290 acres. The people would spend as many as 5 hours to go to another village and get water. In the year 2013, the Gram Sabha in Pophala village, decided on something unique. They decided to figure out a way to get and keep water in their village so as to not be dependent on anyone else. 

From dry land farming to Water conservation
Fatehabad - Another Fukushima?
Nuclear plants are usually located near oceans or rivers in order to have access to ample water for cooling but not the plant at Fatehabad. It is India's largest and could be its most dangerous too. Posted on 25 Mar, 2014 08:14 PM

National Highway 10 passes through Badophal, a village in Fatehabad district of Haryana. The highway is lined by a tiny market and a point where several jeeps start and terminate. These jeeps are headed to Gorakhpur village, some 15 kms away via Kajal Heri, another village en route.

Gorakhpur nuclear power plant site
Managing tanks - a bottom-up approach
Governance by the government must give way to governance by the community if we are to preserve the tanks of Tamil Nadu, which are fast disappearing. Posted on 12 Mar, 2014 10:31 AM

Our day-to-day dependence on fresh water is tremendous, whether for domestic or agricultural use. Theoretically, we know that it is a finite resource and that it can't be taken for granted but in practice, we do. India has an average rainfall of around 1150 mm but lets out nearly 1263 billion cubic metres of water into the sea unutilized. 

Chengalpattu Eri
Interventions of a voluntary agency: The MYRADA experience
Watershed projects have succeeded in varying degrees in the country. If they are weak in organisational management, it is due to the failure of the co-interveners in providing enough opportunities. Posted on 08 Mar, 2014 02:37 PM

MYRADA has been working on watershed development projects since 1984-85. Through its efforts it had developed a climate of trust and confidence at the field level. Peoples' institutions have emerged and stabilised at various degrees of successes because of these efforts. 

Interventions of a voluntary agency
People's institutions managing natural resources in the context of a watershed strategy - A paper by MYRADA
This paper presents concerns and issues in the context of watershed projects promoted by government and NGOs and the role envisaged for Panchayat Raj Institutions in Hariyali guidelines. Posted on 08 Mar, 2014 02:18 PM

This paper attempts to analyse the impact of several government guidelines related to watershed management on the People's institutions that have emerged in watershed programmes where NGOs have a role. 

People's institutions managing natural resources
The great Indian toilet tracker!
Does rural India have enough toilets? Which state has built the most toilets and which state is still backed up? Our visualisations of the Nirmal Bharat Abhiyan's data demystify it all! Posted on 16 Feb, 2014 10:57 PM

Women patiently wait for the sun to go down, to squat in open fields. Young children do so unabashedly on the roads under the open skies. Well into our 67th year of independence, the sanitation situation hasn't changed much in villages and towns across the nation.

Rural sanitation scheme - Progress & Performance
Which way will the water flow?
The 12th Five Year Plan recognises that our current methods of water management have led to inequity. It suggests an approach that involves more input from non-government sources. Posted on 15 Jan, 2014 11:07 PM

In the 60-odd years since we began managing our own resources, we have managed to throttle and poison all our rivers, suck our groundwater resources nearly dry and shave our forests bald. This is despite a great deal of effort, time, thought and resources that have gone into this 'management'.

Ramaswamy Iyer, former Secretary Water Resources
×