Order of the National Green Tribunal in the matter of Nizamuddin West Association Vs Union of India & Others dated 16/04/2025. The matter related to desilting of 24 drains with special focus on two drains - Kushak drain and Sunheri Pul drain before the monsoon. The court was informed that …
The Indian Institute of Forest Management has taken up a ITTO sponsored project on operationalisation of sustainable forestry development with community participation (following the C&I; approach) in eight forest divisions in the states of Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh. This document is a pioneer attempt to workout sustainability index based on …
This is a story of hope and of a major change. For the first time in the last 50 years, several state governments are dealing with drought in a different way
For all the people scripting the success stories, there is a warning: history has seen the death of millions of the country's water structures due to government's apathy. Now, for the first time in the last 50 years governments have really shifted their focus to drought proofing from the adhoc …
Keshubhai Patel Chief minister, Gujarat On overflowing check dams: We needed a permanent solution that not only drought-proofs the state but also provides livelihoods. The effort is to trap every drop of rainwater through check dams. The overflowing dams are a lesson for people to take up more water conservation. …
This is not the only hurdle in making water conservation a long sustained movement. To make it a sustainable social movement and to reap its dividend in the form of poverty eradication, the government needs to put in prolonged efforts. Most of India's poverty eradication programmes have failed because they …
Investment in water is an insurance against poverty and drought. Down To Earth reporters visited the eight villages below during the droughts of 2000 and 2001. These villages have several years of experience in water conservation. The inference: the more the years of water conservation, the more the capacity to …
Kalakhoont village's spin out of the poverty cycle began on a rainy day in June this year. Four days of rain filled up to the brim the long-forgotten tank in this nondescript village of Jhabua district in Madhya Pradesh ( mp ). Now almost the entire village is encircled by …
To fight drought, the Madhya Pradesh government embarked on a water conservation drive in February this year with its Pani Roko Abhiyan (Stop Water Campaign). The state administration geared up to reach all its 52,000 villages. It was inspired by an earlier effort of the state to conserve water through …
Participatory democracy is finally coming of age. At least in Madhya Pradesh (mp). A process that began with empowering the tribal people of Jhabua district in 1994 is culminating in Gram Swarajya for every person living in the 70,000-odd villages of mp . To coincide with India's 51st Republic Day, …
For the rural poor – who depend above all the land for their survival – a central development challenge is to sustain a base of natural capital that can support a robust local economy. In India, government mismanagement of forests, grazing lands, and water resources has often alienated rural people …
congress president Sonia Gandhi has lauded the Madhya Pradesh ( mp) government's efforts in converting the once barren landscape of Jhabua district into a green belt. Addressing a mammoth crowd in the district recently Gandhi said: "When I visited the area with Rajiv Gandhi in 1985, the whole area was …
This paper presents four case studies from India in which rainwater harvesting has lead to both ecorestoration and poverty alleviation. East case study shows that activities to manage local hydrological resources must be preceded by measures to mobilise local communities and create community institutions that can bring the community members …
this is an amazing story. A story that shows that India can start eradicating poverty very fast and very cheaply. This is the story of the degradation and the regeneration of Jhabua - a poor tribal district of Madhya Pradesh bordering Gujarat. In 1985, when I first visited the district, …
the ecological carnage that Jhabua has witnessed in the last five decades is sporadically mentioned in official records. Elder residents, however, remember how the dense forests once enveloped the district. "Hardly 60 years ago, my home was surrounded by dense forests," says 90-year-old Dholji of Samoi village. "The forests belonged …
the pebbles in the fields have become potatoes in the Hathipawa microshed of Jhabua district. In Phoolgaodi village, the villagers are celebrating the Year as the year of the Grass. In 40 ha of degraded government land, the watershed mission took up pasture development, where the production of more than …
When he was the irrigation minister in Madhya Pradesh, Digvijay Singh realised that big dams would only bring him unwanted unpopularity and fail to solve the problems of the largely tribal people of his state. "I realised that big dams were not going to help achieve sustainable growth," he said …
The marriage of Joint Forest Management (JFM) with watershed treatment under one mission was the touchstone for recovery of Jhabua. Even before the guidelines for watershed management were issued by the ministry of rural development, Government of India, in late 1995, the mission had commenced with the formation of 20 …
the tribals have gone to war. The quest: regeneration of the environment. The location Jhabua, an upland in western Madhya Pradesh (mp) with an area of 6,782 sq km and a forest cover of 624 sq km. Almost 80 per cent of this forest is severely degraded or has suffered …
