Order of the National Green Tribunal in the matter of Jagan Prasad Tehriya Vs State of Uttar Pradesh dated 23/05/2025. The applicant has alleged large-scale illegal felling of green trees within the Agra district, Uttar Pradesh. The application revealed instances of illegal tree felling at Fatehabad, Sadar, Kiraoli and Agra …
The summer of 1998 was a wet one. Danes fled to the warmer latitudes to get some sun in their holidays. While they were away, the rain, though unsuitable for sunbathing, was collected in pots, pans, barrels and large storage tanks. Collected to help conserve dwindling drinking water resources. In …
An innocent face bereft of expression. Inscrutable eyes. Stocky build. His appearance can be deceptive. So is the simplicity of his thought. Almost unreal. Meet Chewang Norphel, 62, retired civil engineer. He makes zings (tanks). And artificial glaciers. There is hardly anything about him that seems unusual. It takes some …
JAPAN After battling both water scarcity and floods, the Sumida City in Tokyo has become a trailblazer in catching and using rainwater Rain falling in the reservoir area is a must whereas rain falling in the communities is a nuisance, thinks the average person in Tokyo. Makoto Murase, director of …
Harvest of terror Come harvest time and tense villagers begin preparing for the next elephant raid Like the other farmers, Durlabh Rajbhansu is afraid. As harvesting season approaches, the people of Nopam, a tiny village near Tezpur in northern Assam, steel themselves for the worst. For the last 10 years, …
Threatened by air pollution from the Mae Moh lignite-fired power plant, the people of Ban Hua Fai in Thailand are fast losing patience. Hundreds of villagers suffering from respiratory problems now vow to push for relocation, which has been delayed for almost two years. The villagers accuse the Electri-city Generating …
Five United Nations' (UN) agencies have agreed to extend a US $20 million aid package to initiate a programme for untversalisation of elementary education in India. An agreement to this effect was signed recently by the department of economic affairs, education and five UN agencies - UNDP, UNICEF, UNESCO, ILO …
Since April, more than 500 people in Nepal have died, reportedly due to infectious diseases. This has been happening in the remote villages, particularly in northern Nepal. More than 20,000 people in 35 districts are affected by acute respiratory infections, pneumonia and measles. According to the director general of the …
The firewood crisis has not resulted in a forest crisis. For years, energy experts and foresters have believed that the poor will eat away the forests of the developing world like locusts in order to meet their ever-growing firewood demand. But how much do we really know about the poor …
the Indian government has continuously pumped resources into rural areas to alleviate poverty, but with little success. The core issues-human development, inculcation of values in the society, reduction of conflict and elimination of wasteful practices such as caste discrimination-have somehow been ignored in our paradigm of solutions. Social movements are …
Given this background, the results of the latest survey on firewood consumption pattern in India's rural areas published by Natarajan in 1995 are quite stunning. This survey generated data for the year 1992-93 whereas the last comprehensive energy consumption survey conducted by the ncaer had presented data for 1978-79. No …
The question today, therefore, is: Is the rosy picture presented by the ncaer survey of 1992-93 equally applicable to these areas? The 1991 census also shows that states with large tracts of hills and mountains like the Northeastern states and those with dry regions like Rajasthan are still heavily dependent …
One factor that no study has been able to analyse is to what extent the farmers of India have reacted to the firewood crisis and started to grow trees on their farmlands and private fallow lands or protect their forests. Surely, one would expect a rational economic response from farmers …
a quiet serene house, nestling in a green expanse, surrounded by heavily-laden fruit trees. Nothing new at the outset, for acres of the countryside is sprinkled with such picturesque villages and houses. However, village folk move out of these regularly attracted by the glamour of city life. On the other …
the first major dam to be built in Laos in the last 20 years has sparked off a series of environmental and commercial fears. The us $260 million Thuen Hinboun dam
if one were to go by picture postcards, women in the Indian Himalaya are pretty and dainty, with rosy cheeks and soft hands. The reality, however, is quite different. The glow on their cheeks is a result of hard labour. And their soft hands are callused from the rough work …
Poverty, especially in rural areas, and illiteracy go hand in hand. The majority of the world's poor, about 1 billion of the world's 5.7 billion people, live in rural areas. Of those, 500 million are children. About 40,000 people die every day from hunger-related causes, most in rural areas. About …
THE rural areas of developing countries disadvantaged in many ways, one rthem being access routes. Heavy and flood conditions completely Mdcte these remote villages when Coa h roads are either washed away mud-swamped. Richard Tufnell, International R%C;@nator of the Dry Stone Walling *Avociation of Great Britain has a method which …
FIFTEEN years of tough struggle have today borne fruit ... rather, trees. This is a saga of forest regeneration through local initiative in Chharadan village of Midnapore district. And the hero of the saga is Madan Khatua, whose mantra through these years was to save the forests from avaricious fellers. …
MANY villages in developing countries have partial or virtually no access to electricitv because of unreliable power supply frorn existing grids and prohibitive costs of laying conventional power- lines to remote areas. In addition, the fuel used to power electric generators is expensive. Under such circumstances, can modern health care …
