Order of the National Green Tribunal in the matter of Sonya Ghosh Vs Govt. of NCT of Delhi & Others dated 17/02/2025. The matter related to conservation and protection of Delhi Ridge which is an extension of Aravali Range extending from Tughlakabad and branching out in Wazirabad in the north …
National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) chairperson Ranganath Mishra has asserted that environmental violations such as pollution and fouling up the atmosphere are tantamount to denial of the fundamental rights of people. The assertion marks the commission's slow but steady expansion of its area of operation and jurisdiction. Responding to a …
SMILES lit up the battlescarred faces of the activists fighting the Sardar Sarovar project when the Supreme Court castigated the Review Committee Report (RCR) for being vague, "inconclusive and ambiguous". The committee, which had watered down its own role and independent status, had given no pointers to what the future …
THE COMMITTEE SUGGESTS: • Fresh calculation of the quantum of flow to avoid revision of plan priorities • Efforts to achieve a 60 per cent irrigation efficiency • Rationalisation of drainage pattern to check water-logging and salination • Increase of water allocation from Narmada or harnessing of local water resources …
IT WAS icing gone sour on a cake you can break your teeth on. On January 4 this year, the Madhya Pradesh food and civil supplies minister, Ramesh Solomonand, griped to the press about his disapproval of the state forest department's decision to impose a total ban on the collection …
Salient points • The village or hamlet should be the operational unit for managing their resources • Village communities should haw enough powers and control over natural resources to plan and develop such lands. Community institutions will ensure equitable sharing of benefits • Local institutions for the management of natural …
• The state governments have the right to declare any government land as "reserve forests". The Centre will monopolise the decisions directed towards the state government to constitute reserve forests • No people's rights will be enteriained in the reserved forests • The state governments can bypass procedural necessities in …
In 1982 popular opposition forced your ministry to take back a draft bill on forests. Why have you now rammed through another bill with similar intent? Nobody is saying that the 1982 bill is right. If it were, all I needed was to take that to Parliament. It is because …
THE Rural Development Trust (RDT) , an Andhra Pradesh-based agency, buys a minor asset, a mobike, but forgets to fill up a form and inform the Union ministry of home affairs. Its registration under the Foreign Contributions Regulation Act (FCRA) is promptly cancelled. It was Voluntary Action Network India (VANI), …
To encourage industrial units to provide accurate information in their environment audits, the government may soon amend the format of the environmental statement. The submission of the environment statement is mandatory for obtaining a no-objection certificate, which is issued by the State Pollution Control Board concerned. Organisations such as the …
IN a bid to reduce vehicular pollution, the Motor Vehicles (Amendment) Act, 1994, has stressed upon incentives for the utilisation of vehicles run on non-conventional energy. The amendments, which have received Presidential and Parliamentary assent and are to be notified shortly, gives the Union government more powers with regard to …
GREEN connotations of a different kind have left several Pakistani citizens aghast at a recent decision by the Sindh provincial government to ban the manufacture and sale of polythene bags made of recycled plastic. Officials claim the decision was taken on environmental considerations because the disposal of these plastic bags …
QUETTA in Pakistan has set a precedent by completely prohibiting the sale, purchase and use of polythene bags in the city, as of May 1. Manufacturers have received directives to wind up business, says a Panos report. If the measure proves successful, it will strengthen the case of environmental NGOs …
While the anti-tobacco lobby in India is euphoric about the government's proposed ban on tobacco advertisements in the country (Down To Earth, Vol 3 No 3), Members of Parliament from Andhra Pradesh have strongly opposed the move. A delegation of MPs and All India Congress Committee (AICC) members has told …
THE anti-smoking lobby in India country will receive a shot in the arm once tougher regulations currently being drafted by the Union health ministry are implemented. The proposed measures will introduce a complete ban on tobacco advertising in the country. Such advertising is, at present, banned on the electronic media …
WOOD is out, and matt or glossy steel and plastics are in, as far as the Central Public Works Department (CPWD) is concerned. In line with the government of India's decision to promote wood substitution, the ministry of urban development has instructed CPWD to ban the use of wood in …
In Nepal, the Environment Conservation Council, headed by prime minister Girija Prasad Koirala, has stipulated permissible smoke limits of 65 Hartridge smoke unit (HSU) on diesel vehicles and 3 percent carbon monoxide standards on petrol vehicles. Initially, the new regulation will cover only government and diplomatic vehicles, reports Jan Sharma …
SLOTH bears riding bicycles, leopards jumping through hoops of fire and elephants playing football in the circus ring will soon be a thing of the past. A staggered phase-out of these animals will be done in line with a Supreme Court suggestion in the dispute between the ministry of environment …
A GLOBAL ban on the export of toxic wastes now means that industrialised nations can no longer get ship them off to the Third World and sit pretty. The loopholes that had rendered the Basel Convention on the "control of trans-boundary movements of hazardous wastes and their disposal" a big …
INTELLECTUAL property rights (IPRs) may soon lay claim to and govern the formally codified genetic resources of India. Unfortunately, very few rights and privileges are likely to be created to protect the centuries-deep informal knowledge people have about biological resources. Two proposed legislations -- the Plant Varieties Bill (PVB) of …
In the March 8 hearing of the Taj pollution case, the Supreme Court agreed to consider a more humane way of tackling the problem instead of relocating the hundreds of polluting industries in Agra and shutting down the Mathura refinery. Although the Court has threatened to close down the refinery …
