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 …
function graph() { var popurl="image/20040930/26-graphs.jpg" winpops=window.open(popurl,"","width=300,height=475,scrollbars=yes") } High altitude sickness The Brits made India's hill-stations. Invariably, a responsible officer of the colonial government chanced upon a scene of delirious beauty that completely seduced his senses. Ootacamund or Udagamandalam (Ooty) in the Western Ghats was
function illustration() { var popurl="image/20040930/30-illus.jpg" winpops=window.open(popurl,"","width=500,height=450,scrollbars=yes") } Scarcity amidst plenty summarises the water problem ailing hill-stations today. They receive good rainfall but there is no mechanism to collect runoff for later use. Result: water shortage every year. How did the Brits manage it? They cashed on the terrain, and gravity, …
The stinky spectacle of hill-stations getting buried under their own garbage is turning more real. Look down the slopes and you will see mounds of coloured plastic bags, and tourist staples such as empty packets of potato chips and plastic water bottles. All of which is mixed with vegetable waste …
Evam Piljain, an 80-year-old Toda who's spent all her life in Ooty, feels distraught at the sight of her hometown. "I cannot sit in the verandah anymore,' she says. She moves to her drawing room and gazes wistfully at a photograph of Ooty taken in the early part of the …
Planning is non-existent for India's hill-stations, admit hill municipalities. In the absence of a master plan, a free-for-all situation prevails where one constructs wherever one finds free space; if there is lack of space, one can simply add another storey to one's house. There is no tourist plan, which becomes …
Incredible India. The land of mystic splendour. The hidden paradise. These are just three slogans to convince people to turn themselves into tourists and land up, every summer, in droves in hill-stations. Ooty's annual flower show attracts 0.2 million tourists over two days. In addition, it receives over 0.3 million …
the fury of floods reached Assam's power centre when Guwahati's prominent markets got flooded and experts noticed a crack in the city's only crossover bridge over Brahmaputra river. The breach was repaired in record time. But the crisis in the rest of the state hasn't been assuaged to the same …
India's elephants are squeezed for living space, stressed by development, and growing increasingly violent. So are its people. A report from ground zero on the spreading conflict between one of the world's last great elephant populations and the people who share their habitat.
Human population increases and development in Northeast India have reduced and fragmented wildlife habitat, which has resulted in human-wildlife conflicts. Although species such as tigers (Panthera tigris) and rhinoceros (Rhinoceros unicornis) cause conflict, elephants (Elephas maximus) have become the focal point for conflict and conservation issues. This article presents several …
the much-touted North East Industrial Policy (neip) of the Union government badly needs a ‘mid-course correction’. This acknowledgement has come from none other than S Jagdeesan, joint secretary in the Union ministry of commerce and industry, at the Northeast Expo 2004 at Delhi. He made some other revelations. For example, …
The bamboo industry in India has an industry growth rate ranging between 15 and 20 per cent. The tallest grass has nearly 1,500 recorded uses ranging from medicines and handicrafts to construction. Though India offers a large potential for growth in this sector, poor management and delay in cultivation can …
En masse bamboo flowering is a cyclic occurrence that often has devastating effects: it is followed by massive invasion of big field rats that get attracted to bamboo seeds. These rodents multiply fast and when seeds get exhausted, they turn their attention upon foodgrains in houses and crops in the …
The northeast would become India's economic bridgehead for trade with southeast Asia, Prime Minister A B Vajpayee has promised. He was addressing the chief ministers of the seven northeast states, rubbing shoulders with corporate honchos in Delhi at the Second North East Business Summit, January 21-22. The Centre declared that …
the Union government is reconsidering its decision to curtail central support to states for projects under the Integrated Forest Protection Scheme (ifps). The new arrangement, which requires the centre to provide 75 per cent of the ventures' cost instead of bearing the entire expenses, has caused a lot of resentment …
After neglecting the north-east for years, Delhi now feels the need to initiate "developmental' activities in the region. There is good reason. Indo-Chinese ties are improving. Moreover, a sub-regional economic grouping
A CONCEPT that did not click in the hills of the Northeast has now been prescribed for the plains of the region. On December 1, the Union government inked a purportedly historic tripartite pact with the Bodo Liberation Tigers and the Assam government to create an autonomous, self-governing Bodoland Territorial …
7 pm. Life unanimously locks itself up behind doors. The country east of West Bengal survives a timetable dictated by fear. Its calendar of common histories is scarred with incidents that are located in yesterday's headlines, almost like dictates. The newspapers don't need to exaggerate. And, the extraordinary stories of …
prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee has grand plans to illuminate the whole country by now harnessing hydropower from the northeast region. His logic: hydropower projects will usher in local development. But local communities find this logic alienating. There are widespread protests against new hydropower projects, and, in states like Manipur …
Lalnunmawii (name changed) lives in the Saron Veng locality of Mizoram’s capital, Aizawl. Of her eight siblings, three (two brothers and a sister) have fallen prey to cancer. One of her closest childhood friends died of stomach cancer in 2002. This woman’s husband had succumbed to oral cancer five years …
