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May 12, 2024 Home Reportage Positive Stories By Invitation The Slow Interview Gaon Connection Survey NewsletterSearch for: Their farmland turned barren due to polluting effluent, villagers in UP’s Mirzapur to boycott polls Phase one of the assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh gets underway. But in Jagapatti village of Mirzapur, the inhabitants say they won’t vote in protest against effluents from the carpet industry in neighbouring Bhadohi district’s seeping into their fertile fields and destroying their crops. Brijendra Dubey Elections 2022 If children could vote: In poll-bound UP, high malnourishment but 66% POSHAN funds unutilised With 41% of under-5 rural kids stunted and 33% underweight, government after government in Uttar Pradesh has made several changes to the anganwadi nutrition programme. Hot meals have been stopped, dry rations are in ‘short supply’ and the state government now plans to merge the anganwadi meals with the mid-day meal scheme. Meanwhile, a large chunk of funds meant to fight malnutrition has remained unutilised between 2017-18 and 2020-21. A ground report as part of ‘The Gaon Postcard’ series. Shivani Gupta Uttarakhand Elections 2022: Climate change-induced extreme events not a poll agenda for political parties From Chamoli landslide to Kedarnath floods, Uttarakhand has witnessed umpteen disasters in recent times that have wreaked havoc on its population. Yet none of the major political parties – BJP, Congress and AAP – have raised environment protection as an election issue. Experts warn that climate proofing of infrastructure, investments, and policies in the Himalayan state is crucial. Sarah Khan UP’s villages might vote again on caste and religion. But what they desperately want: clean water. Clean and available water has never been a dominant election issue for any party in Uttar Pradesh, despite some of the worst indices in the country. A month from the start of a seven-phase election in India’s most populous state Uttar Pradesh, Gaon Connection travels to villages to explore the issues that affect the daily lives of the rural citizens. Shivani Gupta ‘No road, no vote’: Elections come, elections go, but these villages in UP yet to get a road Poll-bound Uttar Pradesh has a road network of over 300,000 km. But that means nothing to over 40,000 predominantly tribal residents of 13 villages in Matwar gram panchayat of Mirzapur who do not have a motorable road. The lack of roads adversely impacts the villagers as they struggle to access education, health facilities, markets and employment avenues. Now, they have threatened to boycott the upcoming assembly elections unless their gram panchayat gets a tar road. Brijendra Dubey Holy cow? Not for the UP farmer, who now spends nights protecting crops against stray cattle attacks Stray cattle in the rest of the country have reduced by 3.2% from 2012 to 2019. However, their population has registered a 17.34% increase in Uttar Pradesh. Though the state government has set up cattle shelters, levied additional taxes, and launched cow welfare schemes, farmers continue to suffer crop losses. A ground report as part of Gaon Connection’s ‘The Gaon Postcard’ series. Gaon Connection The Latest Activists miffed as conviction rate for human trafficking reduced by less than half in 4 years Between 2017 and 2020, there has been a decreasing trend in conviction rates of human trafficking cases in India. Activists blame fallacies in the investigation behind this, which results in acquittal of the traffickers who roam freely and threaten survivors in their community. Here’s what can be done. Gaon Connection Chandra Prakash Shukla, who ran a small stationery shop, is now a successful amla businessman A chance encounter with a professor changed Chandra Prakash Shukla’s life. The businessman from Pratapgarh, Uttar Pradesh, now manufactures food products made out of amla. Puja Bhattacharjee ‘Just 4 states have funds left to provide employment under MGNREGA in current fiscal’ A group of activists have highlighted that only Maharashtra, Odisha, Goa and Mizoram have positive net balances to provide employment to the rural citizens under the funds allocated in the Union Budget for the current fiscal year. The activists also pointed out that lower fund allocation for MGNREGA is leading to an increase in rural distress. More details here. Sarah Khan Disability pension less than Rs 500 a month in eight states: Govt Persons with disability are provided less than Rs 500 as monthly pension from the government in states such as Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Nagaland with lowest at Rs 100 in Mizoram. Maharashtra with highest beneficiaries provides only Rs 300 a month to people with disability. Read on to know more. Gaon Connection Marathwada farmer Godavari Dange’s inspiring story now as a comic book Using spare yet elegant text and illustrations in their comic book, Raindrop in the drought: Godavari Dange, Reetika Revathy Subramanian and Maitri Dore recreate an incredible story. Pankaja Srinivasan More than 25,000 Indians died by suicide due to unemployment, inability to pay loans during 2018-2020 More than 16,000 people ended their lives due to bankruptcy or indebtedness while 9,140 people died by suicide due to unemployment in three years, from 2018 to 2020. Read on to know more. Gaon Connection Not only COVID-19 but its medical waste also threatening human health As the health sector expedites its response to COVID-19 pandemic, tonnes of medical waste including gloves, medical masks, testing kits, syringes pile up the burden on waste management systems. The World Health Organization has recommended measures to tackle the problem. Gaon Connection COVID19 infections drop below 1 lakh, government offices to resume in full attendance After a surge in COVID19 cases which was fueled by the Omicron variant in December, India is presently witnessing a drop in the daily cases. With a daily positivity rate at 7.25 per cent, Union Minister Jitendra Singh has announced that all government offices will resume in full attendance. Details here. Gaon Connection 42% Indians hesitant to take third dose of COVID19 vaccine: Survey A survey has found that four in ten people are hesitant to get inoculated with the precaution dose as COVID19 cases drop. Around 81 per cent respondents demand a door-to-door vaccination campaign for the third dose. Details here. Gaon Connection ‘No FIR for seven days, clean chit in 24 hours’: Patna shelter home sexual abuse case gets murkier Accusations of sexual abuse by a 19-year-old former resident of a government-run shelter house for orphased girls in Gaighat area of Bihar have resulted in a controversy with both the Patna High Court and the opposition parties questioning the government over the failure in registering an FIR in the case. Lovely Kumari By Invitation Vaccine hesitancy cannot be dealt with mandatory vaccination Threats and coercion cannot dwindle vaccine hesitancy. People are getting vaccinated out of fear” of discontinuation of social security schemes and not out of fear of the virus. It is important to spread awareness around vaccines and to win the trust of the community. Sharanya Same is not equal; need enabling measures to increase girls’ age of marriage In the current debate on age of marriage, instead of looking at the gaping inequalities across gender, caste, class and religion, which foster underage marriages, the difference of three years between a girl’s and a boy’s minimum age of marriage is being cited as an inequality that needs to be done away with. Amita Pitre Rajasthan’s professional mourners, Rudaalis, are slipping away and need rehabilitation Due to an increase in literacy, the Rudaali tradition is slowly fading away in Rajasthan. People now prefer quieter funerals, because of which these professional mourners are losing their importance. These widows find it hard to make both the ends meet and need to be rehabilitated. Amit Baijnath Garg India, a pharma super-power,...