More than 110 of the 138 water blocks in Punjab have shown a steep fall in the water table, ringing the alarm bells.

The Gujarat government on Tuesday tabled an irrigation Bill in the Assembly which seeks to make it compulsory for farmers to get a licence to draw water from canal or ground well beyond a certain limit and prescribes penal action, including imprisonment, against the errant farmers.

The Bill also seeks to charge farmers for irrigation water reaching any cultivated land within 200 metres of a canal either by percolation or leakage, surface flow or by means of a well-sunk from the canal.

Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda today announced relief for agriculturists using tubewells in Bhiwani district.

Hooda was addressing representatives of the Bhartiya Kisan Union and farmers of the area who had called upon him at his residence here today. Hooda said the consumers having motors with capacity between 12.5 BHP and 15 BHP would be supplied electricity at the rate of 20 paisa per unit for metered supply and Rs 30 per BHP per month for unmetered supply as against the previous rate of 25 paisa per unit and Rs 35 per BHP per month, respectively.

The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government has launched forty-nine projects including across the province for uplift of the agriculture sector.

With the panchayat polls round the corner, the state government in collaboration with the Israel experts will set up two drinking water projects in South 24 Parganas and East Midnapore, where the r

Farmers, whose lands have been acquired for the proposed nuclear power plant at Gorakhpur in Fatehabad, have sought hiked compensation for their lands.

The monsoon was almost missing during June-July, the two crucial months of paddy transplantation, but Punjab is looking once again at reaping a record harvest.