News

Dated: 19th January 2026

SIGMA Foundation has taken a strategy of Gram Panchayat led development by capacitating them in evidence-based planning driven by data and with focus on themes as prescribed under the GPDP (Gram Panchayat Development Plan) Guidelines for attaining SDGs at the local level. SIGMA Foundation is working with several Gram Panchayats which includes Digambarpur GP of Patharpratima block.

The first step is to prepare a baseline by collecting data through a questionnaire-based survey from sampled households to assess the status of development on certain thematic areas, which the Gram Panchayat prioritize. These include issues of Livelihood, Water, Sanitation & Hygiene (WASH), Women Development and Child Development. The GP has also decided to work for attaining zero net carbon emission. So, the questionnaire covers total consumption of energy by the households so that there can be interventions to reduce total carbon emission.

SIGMA Foundation has developed a questionnaire in keeping in mind the priority of the GP and trained volunteers identified by the GP to collect household data under supervision of experts from SIGMA Foundation. A survey of around 400 households has been completed and the data is being analysed by SIGMA Foundation. After that, the baseline status will be presented before the GP functionaries. The findings will be used to prepare GPDP for the year 2026-27 on a few selected themes based on priority of the GP. This will help to monitor progress over time and to know the outcome of planned interventions towards attaining SDGs.
Simultaneously, a Mangrove Change Detection Study (2000–2025) conducted by SIGMA Foundation revealed a net increase of 64 hectares of mangrove cover in Digambarpur GP, rising from 112 ha (3.18%) to 176 ha (4.99%). Despite the overall gain, localized degradation was identified. Five priority mangrove restoration sites have been identified, and the GP will start plantation of mangrove on those sites either directly or through partners.

This integrated effort marks a strong entry point for data-driven, community-led planning, laying the foundation for sustainable development and improved wellbeing in Digambarpur GP.

Dated 31st December, 2025

Dr. Syama Prasad Mookerjee National Institute of Water and Sanitation (SPM-NIWAS), Government of India, in collaboration with the United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS), organised a National Workshop on Participatory / Jan Bhagidari Tools under the Jal Jeevan Mission (JJM) on 22–23 December 2025 at Zone by The Park Hotel, New Town, Kolkata. The workshop aimed to bring together practitioners, government officials, sector experts, and field functionaries from across States to share, deliberate, and document participatory and Jan Bhagidari tools being adopted at various stages of rural water supply schemes under JJM. The discussions focused on the application of participatory approaches in planning, implementation, monitoring, operation & maintenance (O&M), and long-term sustainability of drinking water supply systems. A key outcome of the workshop was to contribute towards the development of a national compendium of participatory tools and approaches, capturing best practices, field innovations, and learnings from diverse State contexts to strengthen community ownership and institutional capacity under JJM.

SIGMA Foundation was one of the invitee organization and Dr. Debasri Mukherjee, Assistant Director (WASH), was nominated to attend the workshop on behalf of the organization. During the technical sessions, she highlighted the significance of Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA) tools in effective planning and implementation of JJM, particularly in ensuring community engagement, inclusiveness, and informed decision-making. Drawing from local and field-level experiences, she emphasized how PRA tools can help identify community-specific challenges, improve service delivery outcomes, and strengthen the sustainability of rural water supply schemes. Her presentation underscored the importance of context-specific participatory approaches, especially in addressing issues related to source sustainability, user behaviour, operation and maintenance, and equitable access. The insights shared contributed to the broader national dialogue on institutionalizing Jan Bhagidari as a core pillar of Jal Jeevan Mission implementation. The workshop concluded with a collective resolve to mainstream participatory tools across States and to strengthen knowledge-sharing platforms to support the goals of safe, adequate, and sustainable drinking water for all rural households.

Dated 23rd December 2025

The Passing Gifts Pvt. Ltd., a unit of Heifer International, has been implementing the Bihar Sustainable Livelihood Project (BSLD) in 6 districts of North Bihar. The project aims at enhancing the income of around 70,000 households through goat rearing and adopting Climate Smart Agriculture (CSA). An amount of Rs 10,000 is given to a woman, who is a member of a Self Help Group (SHG), as Goat Enterprise Development fund. Once she starts earning the amount is returned to the group, which passes that amount to another member of the group to start goat rearing. For training on goat rearing and CSA, Farmer Field Schools have been established. The project has skilled local youths, mostly women as entrepreneur to provide services related to goat rearing and CSA against fees to earn their livelihood. The project has also established Farmers Producers Organizations (FPOs) for enhancing market linkage and arrange for value-based literacy and holistic community development training.

SIGMA Foundation was commissioned as the third party to take up an independent outcome monitoring survey. A mixed method approach was followed for the study. Quantitative data was collected from 854 smallholder farmers, 250 progressive farmers, and 304 entrepreneurs. For collecting qualitative data, 36 Focus Group Discussions were held with 5 types of stakeholders and 90 Key Informant Interviews were conducted with 12 types of stakeholders. The performance of the project was assessed using a few global indicators of Heifer International linked to SDGs and some project specific indicators. Based on these indicators, the project was found to have performed very well. 24% households had closed the living income gap (USD2.15 per capita per day) and 53% were on the path of closing the gap. There has also been a remarkable improvement of the status of women who participated in the BSLD.

The findings of the project were disseminated in a workshop at Patna on the 19th December, 2025, which also discussed the Bihar Agri-food System Strategy. Dr. N. Vijay Lakshmi, IAS and Additional Chief Secretary Dairy, Fishery & Animal Sciences was the Chief Guest. Dr Siddharth, the former Development Commissioner of Bihar, other officials of Bihar Government, academicians from Bihar Animal Science University and representatives of several reputed NGOs working in Bihar participated in the workshop. Dr. M. N. Roy (President) and Mr. Sangram Mukherjee (Assistant Director MEL) of SIGMA Foundation participated in the workshop. The findings of the OMS of the BSLD project were presented by Dr Roy, which was much appreciated.

Dated 15th December 2025

A unique centre for water and environment studies, named (Arun and Dhriti Deb Centre for Water and Environmental Studies) has been established at IIEST, Shibpur, a prestigious engineering college of the country. SIGMA Foundation has entered into a non-financial agreement with the centre to work together for a pilot project of harvesting rainwater in Jajuhatu village within Mathari Khamar Gram Panchayat of Jhalda I block. The harvested water will be used to strengthen agriculture and livelihood of the village.

The high-level engineering skill of IIEST and SIGMA Foundation’s extensive experience in water security, climate adaptation, and natural resource management across multiple states, will provide a technically sound and socially acceptable solution to the acute water crisis of the area. A check dam to harvest rainwater will be constructed to start with in Jajuhatu village.

The project site was visited by a team of ADDCWES and SIGMA Foundation on the 12th December 2025. The team spoke to the villagers, met the elected representatives including the Pradhan of the Gram Panchayat and the BDO along with some other officials of Jhalda I block. The visit will be followed by design of the check dam structure and a survey of the households who are going to be benefitted from the impounded water of the check dam and the check dam will be constructed before the coming rainy season.

Dated 3rd December, 2025

SIGMA Foundation marked a significant presence in both international and national academic arenas through two distinguished scholarly engagements in November 2025. On 17 November 2025, Dr. Debasri Mukherjee, Assistant Director, WASH, SIGMA Foundation, India, delivered a keynote lecture at California State University, San Bernardino, USA. Speaking on “Resilient Water Futures: Tackling Scarcity and Building Sustainability in India’s Changing Climate”, Dr. Mukherjee emphasised the urgency of addressing emerging climate challenges and presented her insightful “think global, act local” framework. The lecture was widely appreciated by international experts and formed an integral part of an academic programme featuring eminent scholars such as Dr. Velvet Nelson (Sam Houston State University), Prof. James Mulvihill (Institute for Watershed Resiliency, CSU), Prof. Rowland, Prof. Spatial Thinkers, and Prof. Jose Muñoz of CSU.

Continuing the Foundation’s academic momentum, Dr. Sabari Bandyopadhyay, Senior Economist, SIGMA Foundation, presented a research paper titled “Sankalp Themes for Rural Population: A Study in Some Gram Panchayats in West Bengal” at the 46th Annual Conference of the Indian Association for the Study of Population (IASP). The conference, themed “People, Planet, Prosperity: Demographic Drivers of India’s Inclusive Growth”, was organised by the National Atlas & Thematic Mapping Organisation (NATMO) in collaboration with the Anthropological Survey of India (AnSI) and held from 27–29 November 2025 in Kolkata.

These dual achievements underscore SIGMA Foundation’s growing strength in advancing research, thought leadership, and collaborative knowledge-sharing across disciplines—from water resilience and climate action to rural development and demographic studies.

Dated 4th November 2025

SIGMA Foundation has successfully completed Outcome Monitoring Survey of Bihar Sustainable Livelihood Development (BSLD) Project implemented by Heifer International through its partner, Passing Gifts Private Limited (PGPL). The project was launched in 2020 to enhance the livelihoods of 71,000 smallholder farmers—with a particular focus on women farmers—across 21 blocks in six districts of Bihar: Madhubani, Sitamarhi, Darbhanga, Samastipur, Vaishali, and Muzaffarpur.

At its core, the project was built on two strategic pillars: a) Scientific goat management and sustainable market linkages to promote resilient, livestock-based livelihoods; and b) Climate-smart agricultural practices to increase productivity while fostering environmental sustainability.

The independent evaluation was conducted over a six-month period, adopted a mixed-methods research approach. It involved a quantitative survey of 1,458 farmers and extensive qualitative assessments through 36 Focus Group Discussions (FGDs) and over 90 Key Informant Interviews (KIIs). Stakeholders consulted ranged from district and block-level administrators to agriculture university experts, veterinary officers, and community-based organization leaders—offered a comprehensive view of the project’s multidimensional impact. The evaluation was anchored in the OECD-DAC framework, examining the project’s relevance, effectiveness, efficiency, impact, and sustainability.

The outcome of this evaluation helped to identify the status of outcomes of the interventions like increase in income, food security, participation of women in decision making of the household, adoption of climate smart practices in terms of Global Index of Heifer International and relevant Project Specific Indicators (PSIs) covering various aspects of the interventions like advanced goat management practices, market linkage through FPOs, training through Farmer Field School, fodder cultivation, performance of the entrepreneurs to provide support to the farmers etc. Based on the study findings, SIGMA Foundation provided a set of short-term and long-term recommendations to help Heifer International refine its future interventions and scale up the unique model across Bihar and beyond.
Two comprehensive evaluation reports and a concise summary brief have been submitted to Heifer International, encapsulating field findings, data-driven insights, and actionable recommendations for policy and program design.

Dated: 8th October, 2025

SIGMA Foundation proudly announces the successful completion of a third-party evaluation of Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene (WASH) facilities implemented by Jal Seva Charitable Foundation (JSCF), the operating arm of Water Aid India, across select districts of Odisha and West Bengal—accomplished within an impressive record time of just three weeks.
The evaluation combined rigorous technical assessments with in-depth qualitative research to measure both the quality and sustainability of the infrastructure and the extent of community engagement. SIGMA’s multidisciplinary team of civil engineers and social scientists inspected a wide range of facilities, including piped water supply systems, borewells, rainwater harvesting structures, toilets (including inclusive facilities for persons with disabilities) involving new technology like BANKA toilet and toilets using Evapotranspiration for sludge management, greywater management systems which included DEWAT schemes and use of Johkasou technology, and school handwashing stations.
The rapid yet thorough assessment demonstrates SIGMA Foundation’s ability to deliver high-quality, actionable insights under tight timelines. The evaluation provides a clear roadmap for enhancing sustainability, transparency, and community ownership of WASH facilities. This achievement reinforces the role as a trusted partner in supporting effective, impactful, and timely interventions that transform rural lives and strengthen WASH governance across India.

Dated: 3rd October 2025

In the year 2012, the World Bank extended support to the Government of West Bengal for implementing the West Bengal Accelerated Development of Minor Irrigation (WBADMI) project. The goal was to provide assured irrigation by creating minor irrigation infrastructure and organizing the farmers in the command area to form Water Users’ Associations (WUAs) to manage and maintain the irrigation system. The first phase of support, lasted until 2019. The state government continued similar initiatives with its own funds until 2023. All these led to benefit of around 1 lakh farmers through creation of irrigation potential of 67,000 ha of land and 2,837 WUAs were formed. Agriculture Support Services were provided to enhance crop production and diversification with climate resilience. The World Bank has committed another round of support from December 2023 to June 2029 to irrigate more areas and form around 1100 more WUAs. But before moving ahead, both the World Bank and WBADMI recognized the need to pause and reflect—how well have the WUAs performed, and what lessons can be drawn to guide better management of irrigation water, enhancing crop production with climate resilience and enhancing farmers’ income?
To answer these questions, the State Project Management Unit has commissioned the Institute of Rural Management Anand (IRMA), now restructured as Tribhuvan Sahkari University (TSU) to take up an evaluation. TSU has, in turn, partnered with SIGMA Foundation to conduct the fieldwork.

The evaluation will have two components. The first one will be to assess the performance of both first phase and second phase WUAs, covering governance of the WUAs, their role in strengthening agriculture and building climate resilience. The study will also come out with some Key Performance Indicators for evaluating performance of the WUAs to strengthen the monitoring system for the project. The second component will be conducting a diagnostic study to understand the causal factors behind poor performance of the WUAs and to know the factors which enable better performance of the WUAs. This study will also serve as a baseline for measuring the project’s long-term impact at the end of the project.

SIGMA Foundation has prepared a mixed method approach and worked out detailed methodology in consultation with IRMA to collect both quantitative and qualitative data to be followed by analyses of the data for evaluating performances of the WUAs and assessing how the project has improved agricultural production and income of the farmers and their level of adoption of climate resilient practices. The field work for the project is to start from the next week and is expected to be completed by the month of December 2025.

Dated: 25th July 2025

SIGMA Foundation is proud to report that two of its members – Dr. M.N.Roy, President of the organization and Dr Ankita Chakraborty, Gender and Health Specialist, attended the 30 th International Conference of the International Union for the scientific Study of Population (IUSSP) held at Brisbane, Australia from the 13 th to 18 th July 2025. Both are members of the IUSSP.

Dr Roy presented a paper (authored by Dr Roy and Dr Chakraborty) “Exploring the role of gender perceptions and practices in facilitating women-friendly development initiatives by the rural local governments of West Bengal, india” in the session on “Policy and Governance as Factors Affecting Women’s Empowerment”. The presentation was much appreciated by the participants. The paper is based on qualitative data collected from 45 elected Gram Panchayat functionaries and members of 9 Gram Panchayats across 3 districts of the state of West Bengal.

Dr Ankita Chakrabarti had a poster presentation on “The struggle for care: insights into the barriers to transgender healthcare in West Bengal, India”. This paper is based on collection of primary data from 81 transgender persons and 54 physicians. The paper is unique as it deals with the healthcare of one of the most marginalized communities who remains deprived from healthcare services and there is little understanding of the issues faced by them. The team gained experiences in attending several sessions during the conference and interacting with the researchers and organizations from across many countries of the world.

Dated: 30th June 2025

A sensor-based Drinking Water Monitoring System (DWMS) using IoT (Internet of Things) technology has been successfully piloted across 10 locations covering various water supply schemes in Health Care Facilities (Rural Hospital and Health & Wellness Centres) and remote villages across 3 blocks of Howrah, Paschim Medinipur, and South 24 Parganas districts in West Bengal. The system monitors critical service delivery parameters such as water pressure, residual chlorine, total dissolved solids (TDS), turbidity, pH, and temperature in real-time. For remote Single Village Schemes (SVS) Public Health Engineering Department (PHED) expressed their need to monitor pump running hours and water lifted in the reservoir, which has been implemented in 2 SVS schemes in Ghatal block of West Midnapur district.
The initiative started in 2022 with the installation of two IoT-based sensor modules in the Amta-II block of Howrah to track water quality and service delivery metrics. Encouraged by the pilot’s success, the project was expanded in 2024 to additional locations, including HCFs and 2 remote SVSs.
Data is collected three times daily and transmitted to a central dashboard hosted by SIGMA Foundation, enabling real-time visualization and analysis. This is proposed to be integrated with PHED systems for use of the data in monitoring the scheme and decision support.
This initiative demonstrates the transformative potential of digital technology in strengthening rural water governance—enhancing efficiency, accountability, and safety in service delivery. It marks another significant milestone by SIGMA Foundation in advancing the goals of the Jal Jeevan Mission in West Bengal through a technology-driven, smart water quality surveillance system.
The intervention is implemented by SIGMA Foundation as a partner of UNICEF and in collaboration with PHED, West Bengal.