POSCO: Villagers demand 5% of share in company's profits

some people in Orissa's Jagatsinghpur district, in a complete turnaround from their earlier stand, agreed to give up land for the posco steel plant on January 5, but with conditions. They have asked for a 5 per cent share in the profits of the company, among other demands.

Row over uranium mining in Meghalaya

the Union Ministry of Environment and Forests (moef) cleared a controversial mining project by the Uranium Corporation of India Limited in Meghalaya last month, triggering fresh protests by local human rights and student groups in the state.

Revisiting Kalinganagar

January 2, 2006. At least 13 tribal people and a policeman were killed in a clash at the Kalinganagar steel complex in Orissa's Jajpur district. The tribal people were protesting the construction of a boundary wall for a proposed mega steel plant by Tata Steel when the violence broke out

SEZs and socialism

the Goa chief minister's unwillingness to allow special economic zones (sez s)in his state must have mildly zapped his central colleagues (see p 24). Has he become a socialist? Doesn't he aspire for his state? But what Digambar Kamat did was to please his electorate; his energy has deflated the commerce ministry and it seems Goa sez s are going to be denotified. We must ask: so it is easy to get rid of the idea of sez, right?

It is misinformation that chareterizes the tiger debate

The notification of the Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act, 2006 (forest rights act) and rules brings a long process to close. But the real challenge is now. There are two extreme positions on the act.

A rose or a ladder?

An argument over a Valentine's Day gift leads shubhranshu choudhary to the politics of an aluminium ladder On the eve of Valentine's Day, a friend of my son persuades me to take my wife "out for dinner and buy her a nice gift". I thank her for the idea but do not ask her to hazard a guess on my choice. She is understandably horrified to hear that I had purchased an aluminium ladder to complement my

Foresters, villagers vie for land in Bengal

tribal villagers in West Bengal's West Midnapore district chopped down around 6,600 young eucalyptus trees on a six-hectare state forest department plantation recently. The residents claim the land in the district's Chandra forest range is theirs and they want it back. Forest department officials rubbish the claims and are preparing to slap legal charges on the villagers.

Centre wakes up to Naxal menace

the centre will recruit around 37,000 personnel under the Indian Reserve battalion scheme for deployment in Naxal-affected states. The decision comes after prime minister Manmohan Singh urged states to "choke Naxal infrastructure and cripple their activities" in a two-day chief minister's conference on internal security in the capital on December 19-20. Referring to Naxalism as "the single biggest security challenge", he urged the states to raise forces on the 'Greyhound' model anti-Naxal force set up by N Chandrababu Naidu, former chief

Githabul tribe gets native title rights in Australia

The indigenous Australian Githabul people now own over 112,000 hectares of national parks and forests in New South Wales, a south-east Australian state.

Representing realty: Artist uses language and image to explore how development disfigures

Kiran Chandra combines painting and print-making techniques to comment on the transformation of landscapes by a process of development founded on a will to reduce diversity to a monochrome. Language overlays image, constantly shifting meanings and challenging established referents. The artist likes to use the mundane imagery of everyday life only to subvert what they speak of and reform is the big unfinished business of independent India.