Order of the National Green Tribunal in the matter of News Item titled "Containers from sunken ship likely to drift towards Alappuzha, Kollam Coasts in 48 hours: INCOIS" appearing in The Hindu dated 25.05.2025 dated 27/05/2025. The original application was registered suo-motu on the basis of the news item titled …
The 1930s-40s: The Indian National Congress (inc) calls upon Keralites to abstain from drinking toddy. The argument is two pronged: social and economic. Toddy tapping is projected as a debased profession that wastes the resources of the coconut tree. Year 2001: Coconut prices drop drastically. Coconut growers, wearing garlands of …
THE contagion appears to have been contained before it could assume epidemic proportions. But it has still claimed four lives. The recent outbreak of plague in the Rohru-Jubbal belt of Himachal Pradesh (HP) highlights how a surveillance mechanism is conspicuously absent in India. While the disease is said to have …
Kagjitola Bhagalpur Bihar. The struggle of 500 families on the banks of the Ganga is to the country's fisherfolk what the Chipko movement was to the forest people of India. In early 1980sit fought a successful battle against landlords and forced the state government to allow traditionalfisherfolk to fish in …
The festivities of January 1, 2002, signified the sealing of a pact between the Kerala government and the Adivasi Dalit Samara Samithi (agitation council) on October 16, 2001. The agreement guarantees allotment of one to five acres (around .5-2 hectares) of land to all landless tribal families in the state …
1971 Private Forest (Vesting and Assignment) Act passed. Provision exempting forestland on which cultivation had been attempted or intended is grossly misused. Worse, the benefit does not percolate down to tribals
Of late growing unrest has been witnessed across the nation over regularisation of tribal people's settlements inside forests. From Uttaranchal in the north to Kerala in the south, land rights of traditional settlers inside forests have not only become a contentious issue but have sparked full-blown political agitations. In Orissa's …
The raging row over raising of water level in the Mullaipperiyar dam remains unresolved with the Kerala state government locking horns with the Tamil Nadu (TN) and the Union government. At stake is the Periyar Tiger Reserve which faces inundation if the dam's water level is raised from 41.4 metres …
for thousands of years now, a stumpy tree prized for its heartwood and sandal oil, has been a source of pride for India. Yes, it is none other than the sandalwood tree. However, indiscriminate harvesting and rampant poaching have left the once luxuriant stands in shambles. It is feared that …
cashew farmers in Kerala are a hapless lot. They are dogged by the falling prices of their produce and stiff competition caused by the wto regime. However, there is hope in going organic. This has been stated in a study prepared by M Abdul Salam, the head of the Cashew …
On july 11, 2001, fisherfolk across the country were thrown in at the deep end when the Union ministry of environment and forests (mef) announced a blanket ban on the catching, processing, stocking and sale of 60 types of sea creatures. These included the entire sub-class of elasmobranches (sharks, rays …
seeing is believing. This idiom seems to be very significant in the light of recent revelations on numerous children dying because of World Health Organisation's (who) blind acceptance of wrong information. Researchers from who and United Nations Children's Fund (unicef) recently analysed vaccination data for the past 20 years and …
the Kerala High Court (hc) has directed the collector of Wayanad district to prevent extraction of timber from plantations in the region. The official has been told to ensure that various state departments do not abet the cutting and removal of trees from both forests and patta (title deed) land …
the familiar sound of conch shells (shankh) resonating during auspicious occasions may soon be a thing of the past, courtesy a recent Union government decision. The July 11, 2001, gazette notification by the Ministry of environment and forests has de facto banned the harvest, processing, stocking and sale of Xancus …
A division bench of the Kerala High Court dismissed a batch of writ petitions which challenged the inclusion of rivers and backwaters in the Coastal Regulation Zone (CRZ) Notification. The petitioners, hailing from Vypeen Island, had contended that in the draft CRZ Notification of December 15, 1990, rivers and backwaters …
water sharing has always been a bone of contention for the states of Kerala and Tamil Nadu. Now, Tamil Nadu's Adavinainar Kovil dam being constructed in Merkkara, Tirunelveli district has aggravated the ongoing strife. Merkkara is on the eastern side of the mountain ridge that separates the two states. On …
The Plantation Corporation of Kerala Ltd (PCK) has been resorting to aerial spraying of the pesticide endosulfan for about 2 decades, 2 to 3 times an year, in 4696 ha of cashew plantation owned by it in Kasaragod district of Kerala for the control of tea-mosquito bug. From 1979, there …
IN FEBRUARY this year, Down To Earth published a cover story on the unusual cases of deformities in Padre, a village in Kasargode district, Kerala ('Children of endosulfan', Vol 9, No 19). The story was corroborated by a detailed study carried out by the Centre for Science and Environment (CSE) …
OVER the past six months, a series of reports have appeared in the media on the 'devastation and misery' caused in Padre village in northern Kerala by 'spraying of endosulfan'. All the reports carried photographs of the same set of unfortunate children born with physical deformities or 'congenital anomalies'. Congenital …
The aerial spraying of the endosulfan pesticide has been temporarily banned in many parts of the Kasaragod district of Kerala. The district collector, C K Visvanathan, on August 9, 2001, passed an order to this effect in response to a memorandum submitted to him by the Endosulfan Spray Protest Action …
Early this month, the Karnataka legislative assembly passed the much-awaited legislation to deregulate the sandalwood business, by lifting government monopoly over sandalwood. The Karnataka Forest (Amendment) Bill, 2001 will now allow cultivation of sandal trees in private lands and the government will also revise its cost. The Bill comes as …
