Lavasa exposed

How government is subverting forest rights act

Two tribal villages in Gadchiroli district of Maharashtra—Mendha Lekha and Marda— savoured victory when they won community rights over their forest resources in August last year. The rights conferred under the Forest Rights Act of 2006 include the right to collect and sell minor forest produce (MFP). These include tendu leaves used in beedis, and bamboo that have high commercial value and were under the forest department’s control. Winning the right to manage these resources meant economic liberation to the two villages.

Crank it up

Arnab Pratim Dutta Sugar mills have doubled up as power generators, with help from sound policies. But profits are falling now. Can states find a way to sustain cogeneration?

Rain Shocked

Archita Bhatta Rising trend of short but intense spells of rainfall is making usable water scarce in India

Let there be CFL

Arnab Pratim Dutta

Fanning an alternative

Today Maharashtra is second only to Tamil Nadu in terms of installed capacity to generate wind power; as on March 31 this year 1,756 mw. The potential? A whopping 3,650 mw in 28 feasible sites.

State inaction

Savvy Soumya Misra Walking in a single file, through wooded paths, they all headed towards the panchayat office in Premnagar block of Chhattisgarh's Sarguja district. They came in large numbers--men and women, old and young. They came from villages far and near. They were mostly Gond tribals. And they all had one question on their mind What was this Forest Rights Act they had been hearing so much about since January this year?

Interstate dirty dumpers

Seventy kilometres from Bangalore, a lorry veered off the main road and headed in an unusual direction towards groundnut fields in Yadagere village of Karnataka's Tumkur district. It stopped at an unsown field in the middle of nowhere. Torches were flashing in the dark. A flurry of activities followed, disturbing the midnight quiet. Some people jumped out of the lorry and began offloading barrels after barrels. Others with spades and shovels emptied them into 10-foot-deep pits in the field.

Dharavi's real estate threat

Poised on the northern edge of south Mumbai is a piece of real estate developers would love to get their hands on. Rubbing shoulders with upmarket Bandra, Dharavi is known as Asia's largest slum, but it's actually much more than that--it's a settlement in which people live and work, producing a wide array of goods and services. The government's plan to 'redevelop' Dharavi is threatening a huge number of livelihoods.

Chikungunya spreads its tentacles