After Maharashtra, the ‘Jal-Hal Yatra’ in drought-hit areas will be held in three Telangana districts, namely, Mahabubnagar, Nalgonda and Medak. Civil society organisations and NGOs will tour nine villages from seven mandals of the three districts between June 2 and 4, to spread awareness about the recent directions by the Supreme Court on drought. This will include Erravelli village in Medak district, where the Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao’s farm house is located.
The team will include representatives from 24 organisations and other individuals, including Swaraj Abhiyan, Ekta Parishat, National Alliance of People’s Movements (NAPM), Human Rights Forum, Joint Action Committee (Telangana), Action Aid, Gramya, Dalit Bahujan Front, Aman Vedika, Commitments, among others.
Starting at 3 p.m. on June 2 at Ambedkar statue of Mahabubnagar bus-stand, the ‘yatra’ will pass through Tankara and Kothapet villages of Hanwada manal, and Kuchur village of Nawabpet mandal in the district.
The next day, the ‘yatra’ will cover Chowdaripalli and Kandlakunta Tanda of Bommala Ramaram mandal and Malkapuram of Turkapalli mandal in Nalgonda district.
On the final day, Gollapalli village of Jagdevpur mandal, Erravelli of Kondapaka mandal, and Kishtapur of Thoguta mandal in Medak district, will be covered, representatives from various organisations informed at a press conference on Tuesday.
Public meeting
A public meeting will be held at Hyderabad on June 4.
In Maharashtra, the tour was conducted for 10 days, from Bundelkhand up to Latur, Ramakrishnam Raju of NAPM informed. Referring to the Supreme Court hearing, he said it was the first time ever for the apex court to conduct hearings for 40 hours on drought, and the directions should be implemented by the Centre and State governments. The key aspects of the directions pertain to the criteria to be considered for declaration of drought, implementation of Disaster Management Act, providing food security to all poor people, mid-day meals during summer holidays, providing employment under MGNREGA, and others. Swaraj Abhiyan, the petitioner, along with other organisations, seeks to assess the implementation of the Supreme Court directions at the ground level, so as to make its plea by the next hearing.
