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 …
The Union agriculture ministry's plan to draw up a national fisheries policy for the integrated development of fishing in India has drawn flak from organisations representing coastal fisherfolk in Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Goa, West Bengal, Maharashtra and Gujarat. The fisherfolk have objected strongly to the Union government's policy of supporting …
The Indira Gandhi Institute of Development Research (IGIDR) in Bombay is to undertake a pilot study to evolve an environmentally sound strategy for the development of Maharashtra's energy sector. The study will be carried out in collaboration with the UN Environment Programme Collaborating Centre on Energy and Environment (UNEP-CCEE) in …
JUST BEFORE 4 am on September 30, the stylus tracing out the narrow, wavy line on the seismographs at the Indian Meteorological Department's (IMD) seismological observatory in Delhi began to oscillate violently. As the graphs rolling out of the machine's printer began to indicate an earthquake 1,400 km away, the …
AT MIDNIGHT on September 29-30, Gulab Jawalge and his family went to bed, exhausted by the prolonged Ganesh Puja celebrations in their village, Mangrool, in Maharashtra. Less than four hours later, Jawalge found himself trapped in a pile of rubble that his house had become. When he extricated himself half-an-hour …
IS THE Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), proponent of saffron Hindutva, turning green? In Maharashtra, the party recently led two anti-pollution agitations that have impressed even the BJP's opponents, save the ruling Congress, which dismissed the protests as an "unnecessary politicisation" of environmental issues. Both campaigns targeted new industrial projects -- …
SEVERAL foods people all over the country consume daily -- milk, butter and cereals, for example -- have been found to contain substances hazardous to health by a nationwide survey conducted by the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR). The ICMR surveyors found that as much as 87 per cent …
Did you do anything to stop your hut from being demolished? What could I have done against the state's strong-arm tactics? There was a 1,000-strong police force in Manibeli at that time, more than 100 of whom came with labourers to raze my hut. I was not there when they …
Though a deadly gas leak two months ago caused nine deaths, Century Rayon is back in full production despite orders from the Maharashtra environment ministry and the state pollution control board (MPCB) to keep the mill closed until all MPCB directives had been implemented. Factory authorities had pleaded then that …
A RURAL health programme operating arolmd Sevagram in Maharashtra has given new expression to Mahatma Gandhi's dream of rural development. The scheme, based on self-help and risk-sharing through insurance, is proof that quality health care can be provided in rural areas at an affordable cost. The moving force behind the …
Residents of Karad and downstream villages on the Krishna in western Maharashtra had no reason to suspect the efficacy of their new drinking water network. But they are victims now of a jaundice epidemic resulting from contaminated potable water in both urban and rural areas. The outbreak has taken a …
When Garhchiroli district collector Subrath Rathod seized a truck illegally transporting teak in Maharashtra last September, an enquiry was held and it showed that illegal timber-felling in eastern Maharashtra, particularly his district and neighbouring Bhandara, is widespread and involves forest, revenue and railway officials. The two districts contain more than …
THE BOMBAY High Court has ruled that bamboo mats are forest produce, thereby contradicting the rulings of both the Gujarat High Court and the additional sessions judge. The pro-forest department ruling came in response to a criminal writ petition filed by the Maharashtra forest department, challenging a lower court judgement …
SUSTAINABLE development is a growing concern for many grassroots organisations, such as the Mukti Sangharsh Movement (MSM) in Sangli district in western Maharashtra. Over the last decade, MSM has involved peasants and labourers in developing scientific alternatives as part of its anti-drought movement, and more recently, in the Bali Raja …
NOVEMBER 28 was the 102nd death anniversary of Jotiba Phule. Though his centenary was not celebrated with the same national fervor as B R Ambedkar's, mass rallies were held to renew the realisation of the importance of Phule as a social radical, especially among the awakening dalit and low-caste masses. …
AT A RALLY of 300,000 people in Shegaon, Maharashtra, last November, the Shetkari Sanghatana put forward a new farm programme called chaturang sheti (four-pronged agriculture). Sanghatana leader Sharad Joshi argued the economic crises and the collapse of statist development models have resulted in the state being unable to extract surpluses …
"MAVA NATE Mava Raj" (our government in our village) is the slogan Sarvodaya workers raised at a 1988 meeting in Maharashtra's Gadchiroli district, to educate people about village democracy. After the slogan-shouting, an old, "illiterate" Maria Gond adivasi, clad in a loin-cloth, stunned the Sarvodaya workers by asking, "You people …
Drip irrigation brought honours and money to Javerilal Kapurchand Kanaria of Nashik district when he ventured out of his cloth business and began growing pomegranates, each weighing more than a kg. Two years after Kanaria started his scientific farming in Taharabad, his balance-sheet -- Rs 6 lakh annually from a …
IN A PROGRAMME conducted by the Academy for Development of Science in Karjat in Maharashtra, farmers all over the country collected some 365 local varieties of rice in as many days. As many as 325 of these were not documented in the 60,000-long official list of the rice plant (Oryza …
THE ENGLISH say that the month of March comes in like a lion and goes out like a lamb. The same may be said about the much awaited Morse Report. The findings are strong and declare that all is definitely NOT well with the SSP. The recommendations are, to put …
THE REPORT of the Independent Review (RIR) of the Sardar Sarovar was expected to look at Sardar Sarovar and other projects on the Narmada not only from the viewpoint of displacement and rehabilitation, but more holistically to see whether submergence itself could be reduced to manageable proportions. Instead, the committee …
