Voluntary Citizen or Civil Society Sector

Featured Articles
October 11, 2022 In an effort to inform the general public, especially citizen activists, policymakers, researchers, and students, about the current status of the Vrishabhavathi river, Paani.Earth has created the necessary maps, data, analysis, and information to drive conservation awareness and action around the river.
Vrishabhavathi river (Image Source: Paani.Earth)
October 1, 2021 Community videos as a tool to influence behaviour change and adoption in rural communities
Community videos are produced by farmers themselves and feature local participants and agents from the rural communities themselves (Image: Digital Green)
September 17, 2021 Benefits of well-managed commons on livelihoods
Collective efforts revived the canal structure of Bichhiya dam bringing water to the village (Image: Foundation for Ecological Security)
September 4, 2021 Committed to use the power of all forms of communication to bring about behavioral change and transformation at scale
Villagers participating in shramdaan for making watershed structures (Image: Paani Foundation)
September 3, 2021 Safe water learning cards being used to train a wide spectrum of stakeholders
Different combinations of safe water learning cards can be customised for a session based on the target audience (Image: INREM)
June 4, 2021 Meet these real-life heroes, who with their consistent and tireless efforts created an impact and turned their local areas into examples to follow.
Meet the water warriors who made a significant change in their own unique way (Image Source: Environment Club)
Deepor beel: Entangled in a net of dangers
Banning fishing in the beel has not only affected the sustenance of the Keot fishing community in Guwahati but it is also threatening the beel's very existence. Posted on 25 Mar, 2014 08:52 PM

“Posua botah”, he said. “The wind is blowing from the west now so we cannot take you to the beel to show you how we catch fish. This wind cleans the water and we won’t get fish. 'Bhatial botah', when the wind blows from the east, the water turns muddy and the fish come up to the surface to breathe. That’s the best time to fish”, he explained.

Deepor Beel awaits a fresh gush of life
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
Floods despite dams
In his bi-lingual booklet titled 'Floods despite dams' ('Barh to phir bhi aayegi'), Dinesh Mishra explodes the myth of embankments and hopes that the issue of floods will be widely debated. Posted on 23 Mar, 2014 10:42 PM

Floods in Bihar have acquired menacing proportions following the embanking of its rivers, which has led to severe dislocations in the society. Estimates suggest that 70% of the population in north Bihar lives under the recurring threat of flood devastation (1). The 2013 floods affected more than 5.9 million people in 3768 villages (2).

Floods disrupt life in Bihar
Cleaning up: From Canada to Kharaudi
NRIs from Punjab have funded sanitation and development initiatives in their native villages, but this model of development is not without its share of hurdles. Posted on 23 Mar, 2014 10:20 PM

In 2003, President Dr A. P. J. Abdul Kalam visited a small village in Hoshiarpur district of Punjab. Kharaudi had done something he thought others could emulate.

Sewerage work at a project village
Water warriors of Chennai
The duo of Sekhar Raghavan and Indukanth Ragade, addicts of water conservation, tell why rainwater harvesting and greywater recycling are important and how they can be implemented at homes. Posted on 19 Mar, 2014 11:03 PM

Sekhar Raghavan and Indukanth Ragade
Technology and public awareness to combat climate change
Using community radio, messages about adapting to climate change and methods to do it were communicated to farmers in Bundelkhand. Posted on 16 Mar, 2014 10:30 PM

In Jhansi, Bundelkhand farmers experience great uncertainties in agriculture due to erratic rainfall. Covering 13 districts of southwest Uttar Pradesh and Northern Madhya Pradesh with a population of approximately 21 million, Bundelkhand is a typical semi-arid region.  Around 83% of the area is rural and more than one third of the households are considered to be below the poverty line.

Crops appropriate to deal with climate change
It takes more than money to make a difference
Eris' and 'ooranis', which are tanks that supplied water for generations in Tamil Nadu, are being revived thanks to monetary donations, good management practices and community participation. Posted on 16 Mar, 2014 10:28 PM

Tamilnadu has a rich tradition of tank management at the village level. Every village had one or more irrigation tanks, locally known as ‘kanmais’ or ‘eris’, and a drinking water tank called ‘ooranis’. This system worked for centuries with the support of residents and the local administration.

View of a 'Kanmai' in Madurai
Protectors of the lost ponds of Darbhanga
Talab Bachao Abhiyan', a group that is working on pond conservation in Bihar, suggests measures to the government and hopes to involve local youth to further the cause of these dying ponds. Posted on 12 Mar, 2014 12:20 PM

In 1989, Bihar's Darbhanga town boasted 213 ponds. Today nearly 25% of them have been drained, leveled to the ground, filled up and built over. Hotels, houses and highrise buildings have bulldozed their way onto these water bodies. Do we not need these ponds any longer? Are they better of as bedrocks of development in these land-starved times? 

Once upon a time

Rally to protect ponds
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
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