Judgment of the National Green Tribunal in the matter of Raghubir Singh Garia Vs State of Uttarakhand & Others dated 22/04/2025. The matter related to illegal mining of soap stone in village Papon, District Bageshwar, Uttarakhand. The complainant, a resident of the village said that illegal mining of soap stone …
Sometimes it is wonderful to have an opportunity to say, "we told you so." Particularly you feel strongly about the issue. A recent issue of Science (September 29, 2000) carries a comment from nine eminent us scientists and economists who argue that "equal per capita emission rights to the atmosphere" …
Environmentalist Anil Agarwal, founder of CSE (Centre for Science and Environment), booming with concern, fighting to strike a balance between environment and development. "A million Gandhis are not a problem but if you have a million Clintons, it's a big problem"
Since forest-dependent communities in India are amongst the poorest people, any bottom-up poverty reduction strategy will have to take forest management into account. Madhya Pradesh ( mp ) chief minister Digvijay Singh's letter to the prime minister asking for a review of the Forest Conservation Act ( fca ) has …
Several years ago, when the demand for a separate hill state called Uttarakhand was first raised, I had asked an eminent environmentalist of the region, why was he not actively supporting the campaign. If there were a hill state he would be in a powerful position to influence its forest …
The library of the Centre for Science and Environment ( cse ) has just put together a collection of clippings from April 1999 onwards on floods in major cities of India. First it was drought and now it is floods, not just rural floods but also urban floods. Urban environmental …
Is the problem of Kashmir merely one of guns and guards or also one of hearts and minds? Unfortunately, neither the Central and state governments nor the Indian media have paid adequate attention to the latter dimension of the problem. C Subramaniam, the former finance minister, has written an interesting …
The meeting of state governors, held in New Delhi on July 12 and 13, had an unusual feature. The President of India, K R Narayanan, had invited Anil Agarwal, director of the Centre for Science and Environment (CSE), to make a presentation on environmental issues at the Rashtrapati Bhavan. Apart …
It seems that a new study from Harvard University in USA has vindicated the position of the pro-diesel lobby that compressed natural gas (CNG) is also very polluting. The report started appearing in newspapers, conveniently on the very day that the Supreme Court was to hear the case on moving …
India's Union minister for petroleum, Ram Naik, lives in the dinosaur age. Only Indian politics can throw up such archaic thinkers, given the pits it has reached. At the 16th World Petroleum Congress, held recent in Calgary, where some 2,000 people were demonstrating and asking for public policies to bring …
With the spate of political support that the concept of rainwater harvesting has received in recent weeks from Central ministers and state chief ministers, the attack from pro-dam lobbies had to come. The government of Gujarat appears to be especially miffed as it had probably hoped that this drought would …
The fatuous Indian elite must also be the most crooked elite in the world. When it comes to linking trade with environment on issues that affect the marauding rich industrialists of the country, you will hear everyone, from the prime minister downwards to the ministers of commerce and finance, shouting …
Director of the Centre for Science and Environment Anil Agarwal and Denis Hayes, who initiated Earth Day in 1970, have jointly won the Year 2000 Global Environment Leadership Award instituted by the Global Environment Facility (GEF). The annual award recognises anindividual group, or organisation in government, the private sector, or …
It was a real pleasure to go with President K R Narayanan to Hamirpura village. People always come to the Rashtrapati Bhawan estate to receive awards from the President. The fact that the President went to the village himself to honour it is a remarkable thing in itself. It is …
it was an event the villagers of Alwar district will not forget in a hurry. Four helicopters, numerous vehicles, a posse of policemen and 30,000-odd villagers had gathered in Hamirpura village in Thanagazi block of Alwar to welcome India's first citizen. And savour the fruits of their hard labour. The …
There was a time when people from other villagers were not interested in getting their daughters married to men from Guraiya village. They had a reason. During summer, the women were forced to carry drinking water from the river Bebas, three kilometres away. Now, it is the other way round. …
A tale of two villages There are about 600,000 villages in India. And perhaps as many kinds of environmental problems they face. It is easy to accept defeat. But Bhaonta-Kolyala did not it's an unusual ritual the villages of Bhaonta-Kolyala follow. Every year, they pour water into a johad - …
"The forest was dense till the 1960s," recalls Suryabhan Khorbade of Sayagata village in Maharashtra's Chandrapur district. During the British rule, people were allowed to enter the forests at their own will. But after Independence, when the forest department stepped in, there was a ban on access to the forests. …
Obensao Kikon (63) belongs to Wokha district in Nagaland. An :rdent jungle burner' at one time, his stint as the chairperson of the Market Federation of Nagaland changed his outlook. Thereafter, there has been no looking back. His 615-ha land in Wokha is full of teak and bamboo trees. He …
