Order of the National Green Tribunal in the matter of In Re: News Item titled "Futala Lake’s charm fades amid neglect and poor maintenance appearing in ‘The Times of India’ dated 25.05.2025". The original application was registered suo-motu based on the news item titled "Futala Lake’s charm fades amid neglect …
THOUGH superconductivity research began with ductile metals -- those capable of being drawn into wires -- 8 years ago, they were sidelined by ceramic concoctions (also known as oxides) of elements like copper, nickel and barium, which could superconduct -- allow the free flow of electricity, without the loss of …
The people of Sheregaon village in Ratnagiri district of Maharashtra heaved a sigh of relief early this month when the Bombay High Court sealed the fate of the Rs-700-crore Sterlite Copper Smelting plant. Delivering its verdict, the High Court bench comprising of 3 judges noted that the panchayat of Sheregaon …
Three voluntary organisations working among the victims of the Bhopal gas tragedy have moved separate applications before the court of the chief judicial magistrate in Bhopal, Alok Jha, seeking an injunction against the Union Carbide management to stop them removing any property from the infamous pesticide plant. They have also …
Little has been done in India to study dam-induced seismicity despite a lot of environmental heat and dust. To bridge the gap, B K Rastogi and R K Chadha of the National Geophysical Research Institute (NGRI) in Hyderabad have proposed to study the seismicity around the Koyna dam in Maharashtra. …
What did you achieve by undertaking the fast at Alandi? This is not the first time I have undertaken a fast to draw the attention of the government to the rampant corruption in the social forestry department. I had undertaken a similar fast in 1990. At that time, the government …
ON JULY 17, the construction of India's largest power station and one of the world's biggest private sector power plants would have begun. The ultra-modern, 2,015-mw plant in Dabhol, 170 km south of Bombay in Maharashtra's Ratnagiri district, is being pitched as the "most efficient solution" to the looming power …
What is the basic concept of pani panchayats? Pani panchayats are arrangements between the farmers of a village to share water resources. There is a limit on the amount of land that can be irrigated -- 0.2 ha for an individual and 1 ha for a family. The beneficiaries should …
In its cynical sense, the price of power is a phrase which often evokes rich imagery. Seen from any angle, the Indian government's decision to go in for what is going to be the world's largest, private sector electricity plant, to be constructed at Dabhol in Maharashtra by the US …
AVARICIOUS contractors, with the active connivance of forest officials and the local people, have indiscriminately felled teak trees in each of the 412 ha of the Mahadapur reserve forest. According to V B Salunke of GGP, at least 2 cartloads of teak wood from the forest has been taken to …
WHAT group irrigation management has done to Mahadapur is what water does to crops -- made it grow and flower. For the first time ever, the Kolam tribals of Mahadapur, an obscure village in the tribal-dominated Yavatmal district in southeast Maharashtra, harvested wheat and vegetables last year. This was a …
ALTHOUGH most Bombayites have welcomed the monsoon clouds, scrap merchants, who are a vital link in the waste recycling process, are in a less buoyant mood: huge quantities of scrap deteriorate during the monsoons because of inadequate storage facilities. In the later half of May, scrap traders requested the Maharashtra …
THE temporary check dams (locally known as bandharas) across streams, have made a huge impact on the agricultural system in Hivare, a drought-prone village 35 km from Pune on the Pune-Saswad road. Even a year ago, the villagers of Hivare wouldn't have dared to dream of watering their fields all …
INTEGRATED development has changed the Hivare landscape in more ways than one. Check dams have raised the groundwater level, slowed down erosion and helped increase crop yields. Villagers like 67-year-old G D Gurav hope that water and fuelwood problems will be solved shortly. The villagers used to migrate to cities …
In a crusade to weed out corrupt officials, noted social activist Anna Hazare, widely acclaimed for his innovative conservation efforts that transformed the Ralegan Siddhi village in Ahmednagar district in Maharashtra into a green belt, went on an indefinite fast to protest government inaction against some corrupt forest officials in …
IN A case unprecedented in the annals of medical science, 10 workers in a Nasik paint factory became infertile due to exposure to some chemicals used in the manufacturing process. The workers, between 22 and 24 years of age, first complained of sterility in September last year. When this was …
HUNDREDS of tin sheds catch the eye as you drive down the narrow roads in Ausa taluka in the Latur district of Maharashtra. Coming up next to the sheds are long rows of one- or two-bedroomed houses -- the spanking new, permanent dwellings for those dislocated by last year's earthquake. …
THE people of Ratnagiri, a coastal district in southern Maharashtra, are a jubilant lot today. A recent report by an expert committee instituted by the state government has vindicated their opposition to a large copper smelting unit proposed in the district. The committee said firmly that such industries would endanger …
DESPITE the normally high prices of organic foods, there doesn't seem to be enough of it going around. Natu Bhai Shah, a sales representative, says that organic products -- bought mainly by "scientists and intellectuals" -- are invariably in short supply. Anil D Shah, chairperson of Mahajanam, a Bombay-based NGO …
P D BAPNA is the owner of a 20-ha sapota (cheeku or sapodilla plum) orchard in the Dahanu area of Maharashtra. Back in the '60s, like other growers, Bapna used chemical fertilisers. But in 1975, after his plants became weak and prone to disease, "perhaps because of the over-exploitation of …
TELANGWADI village in the Solapur district of western Maharashtra is located on undulating and rocky terrain and receives little rainfall. Farmers who are lucky enough to have irrigation cultivate inferior cereals like jowar, bajra and maize and fruits like pomegranates. This barren area is the setting for the success story …
