Environment

Highlights from the issue

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DTE Staff

Sunita Narain’s Desk: Liveable cities need a new model

A modern city in India must not resemble Delhi, which is gridlocked and lacks basic services, from healthcare to clean water

Cover story: First food under threat

What happens when mother's milk, the first food and first vaccine of babies, begins to mirror the load of environmental contaminants?

Interview: ‘It’s a systematic effort by US to dismantle climate policy’

Niklas Höhne, a climate policy expert and founder of the NewClimate Institute in Cologne, Germany, explains what the US' move to overturn its “endangerment finding” means for the country and for global climate diplomacy

Special report: Coal v corridor

Bandhavgarh National Park in Madhya Pradesh has the country’s largest tiger population and sits adjacent to coal deposits

A proposal to mine coal along a corridor that links two tiger reserves in central India is a step away from getting final clearance. The move could affect movement and genetic diversity of tiger populations in the region

Special report: Unwanted barter

In Bikaner district’s Bhanipura village, farmers estimate that 10,000 khejri trees have been cut since 2024 for a solar plant

Pursuit of renewable solar power in Rajasthan sees indiscriminate felling of khejri trees vital to the Thar landscape

Special report: A bridge across forever

Residents of Jabarra contribute funds and labour to construct a causeway on the Kajal river every year using wild grass, sand and cement

For two decades, a Chhattisgarh village remains stuck in a loop of building temporary river crossings to access markets and sell forest produce

Appraisal: Charged with eco-rage

Awareness of climate change, and the stress it induces, may be linked to rising aggressive behaviour among young people

Patently absurd: India’s challenging AI predicament

Hobbled by lack of innovation and AI skills in its crucial technology sector, India is focusing on a ruinous plan to host data centres

Civil lines: Poverty, sans the threshold

A homeless man in Mumbai.

Oliver Sterck's 'average poverty' measure considers the entire income distribution

Opinion: The great pivot

China has moved towards an aggressive nationwide mandate for its coal fleet to serve as a critical peaking resource, backed by a fixed-cost recovery mechanism that ensures plants remain economically viable while operating at lower, more flexible loads.

China’s moves to transition to clean energy offer critical lessons to India

Opinion: A step back

Van panchayats are unique to Uttarakhand since 1931, as the backbone of participatory forest management

Recent amendments to Uttarakhand’s Van Panchayat rules push the state into a risk zone. The state must usher in forest reforms to rescue community forest governance

Life and nature: Saintly guardians

A female ruddy shelduck leads her chicks across a high-altitude wetland in Ladakh

For over 20 years, residents of Mudh village in eastern Ladakh have been protecting the ruddy shelduck that visits their mountains to breed