Experts give them a miss

farmers do not disappear when they are not making news by protesting support prices or committing suicides (see Sweet victory)

War-like climate

In 1983, Alex De Waal, a doctoral candidate at the Oxford University, was doing his fieldwork in Sudan when he met a bedridden and nearly blind pastoralist, Hilal Abdalla. He said 1983 was an unusual year.

An ecological triumph goes sour

In 1929 when a British engineer identified the Silent Valley as among the best sites in Kerala for a hydropower project, he could not have imagined that 50 years later the valley would be at the centre of a controversy. Tucked away in the Western Ghats, the valleys tropical evergreen forest has evolved over 50 million years and holds secrets about the evolution

POSCO looms over Republic Day

FIR against dam activists

police have booked villagers and anti-dam activists who disrupted a public hearing in Uttarakhands Chamoli district on October 13. The state pollution control board (spcb) had organized the hearing in Kulsari village to get public views on the 250 MW Devsari hydroelectric project on the Pinder river, a tributary of Alakananda. The project, proposed by Satluj Jal Vidyut Nigam, will displace 491 families. Angry villagers and activists did not allow the public hearing to

After SEZs, nuclear power parks

mango orchards in Gujarats Bhavnagar district and paddy fields in Andhra Pradeshs Srikakulam district will disappear under nuclear power parks that will have eight power plants each. The government approved the projects in the last week of September. The US India Business Council (usibc), a trade group from Washington that lobbied hard for the sites, is upbeat.

Meghalaya erupts over mining lease

ON AUGUST 24, the Meghalaya government decided to hand over a large parcel of land in West Khasi Hills to the Uranium Corporation of India Limited. Citizens' groups have opposed the decision to lease 422 hectares (ha) of land for uranium mining saying it will affect people's health. Chief Minister D D Lapang claimed

Not ready to till

Riot-hit farmers keep away from fields; vegetable prices soar Rabindra Singha is staring at a bleak future. His 1.6 hectares (ha) in Rowta Bagan village are lying uncultivated. He lost his yield last year in riots

Dear friends

Please accept my greetings I am a Dongria Kondh and take pride in my identity. I live in the Niyamgiri hills. The hills are also the abode of our gods. It never occurred to us or our ancestors that our home or way of living would one day come under threat. And such a time is upon us. We do not know what will happen to us when Vedanta's machines dig up the hills we live in.

Non-lethal bomb

Indian security forces will soon have a new weapon to take on insurgents in the country's Northeast--a chilli bomb. The Defence Research and Development Organization (drdo) is testing hand grenades stuffed with bhut jolakia (chillies) from Assam--recognized as the world's hottest.