Order of the National Green Tribunal (Central Zone Bench, Bhopal) in the matter of Naresh Vashisth Vs Union of India & Others dated 08/04/2025. Issue raised in the application is encroachment of land of village Amer which comes under reserved forest and "Vankhand Amer-54 of Nahargarh Wildlife Sanctuary." The Assistant …
The Pooyamkutti hydel power project in Kerala's Idukki district cleared by Kamal Nath, is another hotbed of controversy. Conceived by the Kerala State Electricity Board (KSEB) decades ago, the project was to produce 700 MW of power by building series of dams on the PooyamKutti river. A KSEB report had …
Kolaghat's (in Midnapore, West BengaD 1.260 MIN thermal power project has been the bane of thousands who have been struck by silicosis due to flyash generated by the project; silicosis is caused by sustained exposure toactive silica' floating around in very fine dust form, which lodges itself in the respiratory …
AS THE party in power at the Centre for 45 out of 49 years, the Congress(i), with all its factions, can be held mainly responsible for India's achievements and failures. In the politically tumultuous '70s, ,environment' was attracting international attention, with the UN- sponsored Conference on Human Environment taking off …
AS THE poll date neared, notes on issues such as gender, justice and natural resource management often got lost in the noise of campaign slogans. Conventionally, such issues are considered psephologically insignificant. But this time, although women do not really figure prominently in the mandate of 1996, issues like prohibition, …
The parliamentary elections are just around the corner and activists throughout the country are keen to project the environment as an issue before the electorate. The first to do so was the National Alliance of Peoples Movements, which recently concluded its yatra in Wardha, Maharashtra. Two more campaigns have quickly …
AS THE general elections approach, a number of independent initiatives to influence the mainstream political process are coming up. The overriding concern of most of these initiatives by the non -governmental organisations (NGOS) - who are generally opposed to the prevailing model of development, and want to redefine development in. …
RIGHT now in the US, all eyes are glued on the presidential contenders for the forthcoming elections. Too bad, because (Bill Clinton being a jellyfish) it makes little difference who sits in the White House than which party dominates the Congress. One of the vital hinges in that difference is …
THE fact that laws which govern the cooperative sector have always left successful cooperatives tantalisingly within the reach of political leadership has once again come to the fore in Gujarat. The almost idyllic calm at Amul, the most successful of such ventures in the country, was shattered when it was …
Chief Election Commissioner T N Seshan has sent a missive to district administrations instructing them to register various communities which hitherto had been left out of electoral and census lists on account of their "nomadic practices". By mid-November, the first exercise under this programme bore fruit when nearly 15,000 Van …
AFTER a gap of 4 uneventful years, the Greens have emerged as a strong force in the German parliament bagging 7.3 per cent of the vote. "We can remove the current government if necessary. I don't exclude its collapse during the next 4 years," said the jubilant co-leader of the …
Any initiation of local democracy unmanacled of centralisation is always welcome: it provides a grab-as-grab-can opportunity for the chained to grab the ballot as a vehicle of expressing their desires. The twist, however, is that the state wilfully distorts the popular demands from below, diverting and diluting the emerging challenge …
MORE than a month after the signing of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), ignorance and uncertainty about its implications continue to prevail among Indian agriculturists. The principal issues for farmers is whether they can retain and sell seeds and whether they will be able to compete in …
Dharwad (Karnataka) Opposition to GATT in Karnataka is spearheaded by the Karnataka Rajya Raitha Sangha (KRSS), which has gained strength over the past 2 years and forced the ruling Congress government to accord comparatively greater seriousness in projecting its viewpoint of GATT. The thrust of the official programme -- to …
WHATEVER the outcome of the byelection in Rajasthan's Rajakheda assembly constituency on May 26, it will be remembered for one thing: GATT as a campaign issue. Previously, elections in Rajakheda were always contested along caste lines: Brahmins versus the rest. But now, Samajwadi Party candidate Mohan Prakash, a former legislator …
On the government's information campaign: We have to deal with a great deal of disinformation about GATT. We have launched a counter-campaign to present the right picture. We are organising seminars, workshops and taking up public contact programmes and distribution of literature on how Indian farmers will benefit from GATT. …
ALTHOUGH commerce minister Pranab Mukherjee maintains that India has good chances of cornering a sizeable chunk of the projected increase in world agricultural trade (up to 7 per cent, according to International Monetary Fund estimates) in the post-GATT era, there are overwhelming doubts about such claims. The increase in trade …
Gatt on TRIPS • Provides for protection of plant varieties. • Microorganism and microbiological processes are patentable. • Countries can either provide for patenting of plant varieties or develop an effective sui generis system of protection or a combination of both. Pro-GATT position • This will not affect farmers' rights …
ANTI-GATT ALL the major opposition parties, with the help of mass-based organisations, are planning either demonstrations, rallies, civil disobedience movements or study camps for farmers throughout the country to protest GATT. In the Rajya Sabha, where the Congress is in a minority, opposition parties are getting together to prevent GATT-related …
THE ISLAND state of Tasmania, with its relative abundance of natural resources and wild countryside, is the home of the world's first Green party, the United Tasmania Group (UTG), which elbowed its way into Parliament with an 18 per cent vote in 1989. It was a victory that came after …
