India's water future remains very bleak. The monsoon season, which once extended to 4 months, is now down to less than 30 days of heavy rain.
The news will augur well for the country as large parts have been witnessing agriculture distress and water levels in reservoirs in west and south India have dipped to low levels.
As the southwest monsoon moves slowly across the southern peninsula, the India Meteorological Department (IMD) in its latest report said the overall rainfall during the second week of the four-month season was almost 50 per cent less than normal.
A dozen people lost their lives in various rain-related incidents in and around Chennai while personnel on fishing boats and farm tractors were engaged in rescuing stranded people on Tuesday.
Tokyo -- the songs Japan, Love In Tokyo and Sayonara from the 1966 Hindi film automatically pop up in the mind -- is buzzing and crowded like any other metropolis, discovers Deepa Gahlot. The modern apartment blocks are built cheek by jowl, so close together that one can open the window and borrow sugar from the neighbour in the next building. One of the fears of the Indian traveller is the unavailability of vegetarian food. Every city and town in Japan has an array of Indian restaurants that serve every variety of cuisine, right from Gujarati to Punjabi to Andhra and Kerala meals.
Water level in the Mullaperiyar dam is threatening to cross the permissible limit of 142 feet, leading to fears about the safety of the people living downstream from it in Kerala even as six spillway shutters were opened on Monday night to release excess water.
A portion of the 15-foot tall private compound wall, totally wet due to heavy rains lashing the area for the past few days, fell on the adjoining tiled-roof houses in Nadur village.
Sixteen deaths in rain and flood-related incidents have been reported from western Maharashtra in the last seven days, while the toll in Karnataka rose to five since Sunday.
'A person weighing 68 kilograms on the Earth would weigh only over 11 kg on the Moon'
Rescuers in quake-hit Chinese village faced difficulty in evacuating villages near rising lakes formed by landslides, complicating relief efforts following a powerful 6.5 magnitude earthquake that killed at least 410 people and injured 2,300 others.
'Why is a commercial venture being held responsible for a situation caused by mismanagement of the state?' asks N Suresh.
Sowing had started on a sluggish note in several parts of the country because of delay in the onset of the monsoon but has picked up pace subsequently as the rains progressed and performed appreciably well in August.
A weak monsoon and the subsequent shortage of electricity has pushed Bangalore into an unprecedented fuel crisis.
Parts of Raigad, Ratnagiri districts in the coastal Konkan region and Kolhapur district in western Maharashtra, have been worst affected by the floods. Besides that, heavy rains have been pounding parts of Satara district.
Saturday's special search operation to trace the 17 missing engineering students from Hyderabad yielded no results as the 450 rescuers combing the 3-km stretch of Beas river, whose water level was lowered to minimum, failed to recover the body of any student.
The automobile sector is considered a good indicator of economic health. It has a very long value chain, from primary materials, like metals, glass and plastic, to value-added high-end electronic components, specialised alloys, and software.
Three national highways in Kutch, Navsari and Dang districts were blocked due to damage caused by rains. Fifty one state highways and over 400 panchayat roads have also been damaged, state Disaster Management Minister Rajendra Trivedi told reporters.
More than 53,500 people were now staying in various relief camps across the state.
The water level of Pong Dam, also known as Beas Dam, reached at 1386.84 feet-mark on Monday at 11 pm against the danger level of 1390 feet.
The met department said that rainfall in August is projected to be within the normal range at 97% of LPA. In August and September, India receives around 43 mm of rainfall.
Fresh rains triggered by a low pressure compounded the miseries of flood victims in Odisha.
The cyclonic depression may have crossed the Tamil Nadu coast on Thursday evening, but the state continues to be battered by heavy rains.
Inundation caused by monsoon rains continued to trouble people here and in other parts of the state, while Chief Minister M K Stalin on Tuesday inspected rain battered areas and distributed assistance to the affected people.
The India Meteorological Department (IMD) has forecast heavy rainfall in Mumbai and suburbs with very heavy to extremely heavy rains very likely at isolated places.
BJP candidate from Ballari City G Somasekhara Reddy has said his brother's wife and rival Kalyana Rajya Pragati Paksha (KRPP) candidate Aruna Laxmi is a 'housewife and has no idea about the problems of the constituency'.
As the storage level touched 3,000 million cubic feet in the Chembarambakkam reservoir as against its full capacity of 3,645 Mcft, authorities on Wednesday began releasing about 1,000 cusecs into the Adyar river as a precautionary measure.
Flood waters engulfed vast areas of the delta region of Mahanadi river system in Odisha even as the death toll due to heavy rains and floods in the state climbed to 34.
The decision to suspend the operations was taken after shutters of the Idamalayar and Cheruthoni dams, part of Idukki reservoir, were opened on Tuesday evening to release excess water.
Berhampur, the biggest city in southern Odisha, on Monday looked like a war zone as Cyclone Phailin left behind a trail of destruction. The cyclone accompanied by heavy rain hit Gopalpur, about 15 km from Behrampur, and battered the city and its nearby areas.
Faced with cut in water supply from Haryana due to the Jat stir, the Delhi government announced closure of schools on Monday as part of water rationing in the city to deal with the crisis.
Till Thursday, the country had received 41 per cent less June rainfall than normal - the scantiest in a decade and one of the rarest occasions when the shortfall in the month was more than 30 per cent - private weather forecaster Skymet said in its daily weather forecast on Friday.
This year, the monsoon was above normal in almost all parts, except in North-West India, which comprises the major grain producing states of Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan, along with states such as Himachal Pradesh, the NCR, Uttarakhand, and J&K.
Rains on Friday continued to batter several parts of Tamil Nadu under the influence of an active North-East monsoon as the toll in rain-related incidents in the state stood at 48.
Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M K Stalin on Thursday said he has requested Prime Minister Narendra Modi to provide additional doses of COVID-19 vaccine to the state.
He also gave examples witnessed at various places, like changing of the crop pattern in view of scarce water and adoption of sprinklers, drip irrigation, water harvesting and water recharging methods.
There seems to be no respite from floods in Assam, as the Brahmaputra and its a few tributaries are maintaining a rising trend affecting over 1 lakh people in seven districts of the state.
The India meteorological department has stated that day temperatures are likely to be above normal by 0.5 degree Celsius, reports Sanjeeb Mukherjee.
The picture looks no better for Wednesday with the weather office forecasting heavy to very heavy rainfall for Tamil Nadu.
'The Cauvery river has become excessively politicised by all political parties.' 'They see a vote bank in an emotive issue of this kind.'
In the wake of the Supreme Court rejecting Kerala's contention in the dispute with Tamil Nadu over the Mullaperiyar dam, the state on Monday sought Centre's mediation and a presidential reference to the apex court to address its anxiety over the issue.
