Order of the National Green Tribunal in the matter of In Re: News Item titled "Nayar river is vanishing - a yatra reveals conservation goes beyond science and policy" appearing in ‘The Down To Earth’ dated 03.06.2025. The original application was registered suo-motu based on the news item titled "Nayar …
THE RECENT floods that engulfed more than two-thirds of Bangladesh killed more than 500 people and destroyed one million tonnes of foodgrains, resulting in a loss of $175 million to the government. However, despite Bangladesh renewing demands that India and Nepal control the powerful rivers that flow through their countries, …
THE MAN who moved the Supreme Court in ???? to constitute a tribunal to solve the dispute over the Cauvery waters between Karnataka and Tamil Nadu was S Ranganath, secretary of the Tamil Nadu Cauvery Delta Farmers' Association. Says Ranganath, "A legal solution had to be found. We had no …
CHINA'S plan to build the Three Gorges dam across the Yangtze river with a 185-m-high reservoir level "would not be an economically viable proposition", according to the World Bank. Probe International reports the World Bank endorsed a Canadian feasibility study of the dam, which contained evidence that raising the water …
AS THE Cauvery water dispute between Karnataka and Tamil Nadu lurches from one deadlock to another, water resources experts in India are even more disturbed at the prospect of a larger crisis. The "resource hysteria" generated by the Cauvery tangle may just be a precursor to similar "flashpoints" in India, …
Nation in turmoil RIMJHIM JAIN FLOODS are a major source of human misery in India and this year, too, they have wreaked havoc. Agriculture minister Balram Jakhar claims 2 million ha of cropped area has been damaged this year by the swirling waters. Reports from across the country present overwhelming …
THE CAUVERY, one of the major interstate rivers of south India, has been both a blessing and a curse to Karnataka and Tamil Nadu: it has helped farmers but also caused discord. Irrigation from the Cauvery has been more developed in Tamil Nadu than Karnataka. The reason is geological: Whereas …
For 50 years the Mettur dam was completed. Tamil Nadu farmers used more than 75 per cent of the Cauvery waters, which was largely responsible for the tremendous escalation in rice cultivation in the state. The crisis, however, set in after Karnataka began developing its irrigation system based on the …
DESPITE continuing criticism from ecologists, work has started on the Three Gorges Dam along the Yangtze river in China, the world's largest hydroelectric project. The project includes a 185-metre-high dam stretching about two kilometres along the third of the Yangtze river's three famous gorges and is meant to fuel China's …
THE NILE delta lies trapped between a dammed Nile and a rapacious sea that is constantly threatening to swallow it up. The death of the delta, which constitutes two-thirds of Egypt's habitable land, will be catastrophic because with 1.33 million births every year, Egypt's dependence on the river and its …
AS THE sun rose slowly over a picturesque Andean valley in south Ecuador last month, fear-stricken people sheltered on high ground watched helplessly while a deluge of storm water swept through the valley, washing their homes and crops away. "It's a lifetime's work, senor, the bread for our mouths every …
Even as the state government continues to accuse Tata Iron & Steel Company (TISCO) of unchecked deforestation around Jamshedpur, it has also locked horns with TISCO over riparian rights in the nearby Suvarnarekha river. Bihar's firebrand minister of irrigation, Jagdanand Singh, is demanding Rs 15 crore as the state's "rightful …
GEOLOGISTS have found traces of a river that flowed between 5,000 and 11,000 years ago in the desert expanse of the Arabian peninsula. Some stretches of the river may have been as wide as 5 km wide, says Farouk El-Baz, director of Boston University's remote sensing centre (New Scientist, April …
THE CYCLONE that struck southern India in October-November 1992 caused unusually extensive damage in Kanniyakumari district. The area was lashed daily by winds of 80 km per hour and 10-15 cm of rain. There were landslides, and major roads, railway tracks, bridges and houses in the district were washed away. …
IRAQ OPENED its Third River, a vast drainage canal flowing midway between the Euphrates and the Tigris, in early December. The 565-km-long main canal, which took 40 years to complete because of revolutions, wars and sanctions, will reclaim 1.5 million ha of Iraq's agricultural land (of which 300,000 ha have …
ALMOST all the rivers that originate near the Arabian Sea flow eastward into the Bay of Bengal because of the peninsular tilt. One river that deviates from the norm is the Cauvery, which suddenly turns southwards before-heading east again. Geologists believe the Cauvery is actually two rivers that were joined …
WITH THE national rehabilitation policy on the anvil, this timely book raises important questions regarding humans displaced by development projects. After citing acquisition of land for development projects as the most visible cause of displacement, the book surveys big dams as they, more than other development projects, cause the maximum …
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 …
Israel will run out of drinking water in three years unless the government moves fast to eliminate massive mismanagement of the resource. Israel uses almost 80 per cent of the resources in the area. Now the Palestinians want half of it and Jordan wants a fair share of water from …
THE BLUE Danube lost much of its magic when on August 1 Slovakia started dumping concrete blocks weighing several tonnes into the river. By October 20, these had narrowed the Danube from 400 metres to 160 metres. Slovakia was at the time given permission by the Danube Commission, the association …
AGRICULTURE IN south India has traditionally been based upon small-scale irrigation, using tanks, wells and river water. In this system, temples were not merely places of worship but played a pivotal role in irrigation management. They represented the crystallisation of community efforts, which explains why Tamil Nadu chief minister J …
