This case study reports on how the various stakeholders came together to alleviate the problem of effluents discharged by factories in the industrial estates on the eastern periphery of Ahmedabad into the Kharicut canal that flows into the Khari, a tributary of the Sabarmati.

After the richer locals leased land/water from the poor cooperatives in the 1970s in Kolleru in Andhra Pradesh, the land has remained in the name of poor "beneficiaries", while the real fisherfolk work on meagre wages.

Rising population and over-exploitation of groundwater for irrigation has aggravated conflict among farmers located at the upper reaches and the tail end of the Palkhed canal system of the Upper Godavari project of Maharashtra.

An increase in population, unplanned expansion in the command area of the river Bhavani in Tamil Nadu and the growing domestic and industrial demand for water have intensified competition among water users in the river basin.

The island of Majuli on the river Brahmaputra has been under constant threat from floods as well as rising erosion levels. Tension has simmered between development agencies responsible for flood control and the local people who have opposed the structural measures. The proposed Bogibeel bridge has evoked concerns that the conflict will see an escalation.

Conditions of water scarcity have been aggravated in Vadali village of Gujarat due to the persisting differences between higher castes, chiefly the ahirs, and those lower in the hierarchy such as the kolis and other dalit castes. Power relations are linked to social and economic hierarchy and the issue of resource inequity must be tackled through policy and advocacy measures.

The conflict over the use of the waters of the Panchna dam for the Keoladeo National Park, in which upstream farmers in the command area of the dam have staged protests, is about rapidly decreasing water supply amidst a growing number of users.

Water conflicts in India have now percolated to every level. They are aggravated by the relative paucity of frameworks, policies and mechanisms to govern use of water resources. This collection of articles, part of a larger compendium, is an attempt to offer analyses of different aspects of water conflicts that plague India today.

The work in the B R Hills of Karnataka by H Sudarshan, a medical doctor, on the primary healthcare of the Soliga tribes is a rare example of the role of equity, social justice, maximum community participation and empowerment of the people, in addition to the encouragement of indigenous and traditional systems of medicine, in a successful community health programme.

Though there is a great deal of variability in the expected performance of Bt cotton depending on the environment, the regulation and marketing of the hybrids reflects a uniformity of approach that is inexplicable. Academic studies continue to talk of the importance of studying toxicity and monitoring resistance build-up even as initial resistance management plans at the farm level fail.