Order of the Supreme Court in the matter of Sugra Adiwasi & Others Vs Pathranand & Others dated 29/04/2025. The bench of Justice Pamidighantam Sri Narasimha and Justice Joymalya Bagchi directed the state of Madhya Pradesh as well as the central government through the the Ministries of Tribal Affairs and …
April 2, 2001 will go down as a sad day in the history of India's environmental movement. Four tribals were shot dead by the police in Dewas district of Madhya Pradesh ( mp ). Their crime: cutting trees for beams to support the roof of their house. The firing took …
the Madhya Pradesh government would like to forget it. The residents of Dewas district, however, will remember it for the rest of their lives. Four people were killed in a confrontation between the administration and the tribal people at Mehendikheda village, about 100 km from the district headquarters of Dewas, …
The New Delhi-based National Patent Office has granted a patent of an anti-diabetic medicine to the Kani tribals of Kerala. The medicine, now scientifically proven to be potent and safe, is derived from the roots of the creeper Humboldita decurrens ( Chembravalli in Malayalam). The herb has been used traditionally …
INDIA might be the software superpower but its remote villages still remain caught in a time warp where the effects of modernistion have not yet filtered down. Even after 54 years of independence, the rhetoric of development and conservation rings hollow without the people's participation in development schemes. Here in …
at the sun sets on Tentuli, a village in Keonjhar district of Orissa, it is time to prepare for a long, sleepless night. As darkness descends, the male members of the village make sure that the children and women are tucked away in the safety of tree houses they have …
Past experiences have shown that centralized management of natural resources, based on a culture of exclusion and rules, has not contributed to the sustainable management of natural resources. This important realization has led to a series of policy changes in the recent past that provides an ever-widening democratic space to …
THEORITICAL and empirical studies of collective management of natural resources have proved the efficacy of common property as an efficient institutional arrangement. In India, joint forest management (JFM), involving partnerships between forest-based communities and the forest departments for the protection and management of forests, was initially successful but certain core …
While tiger parts, ivory and sandalwood smuggling continue to attract all the public attention, what India is losing is its medicinal wealth to well-organised smuggling networks run by thousands of Veerappans all across the country. Mum's the word on the trade practices, while forests, whether in the north, south, east …
It is a common sight near every forest area to see loaded trucks making their way through the dark cover of the night. The first thought that crosses one’s mind is that they are weighed down with timber. Wrong. Many times, what is being carried out is the herbal treasure …
In April 1999, a director of a reputed environmental organisation in Dehradun was tipped off about 12 trucks waiting at the check-post in Dehradun. They were carrying in various quantities medicinal plants that did not feature in the list of ntfp allowed to be collected in the region comprising Uttaranchal, …
The Indian herbal industry is estimated to have a turnover of Rs 2,300 crore annually. It is also involved in the export of finished products, intermediaries and bulk raw materials. More than 90 per cent of the plant species used by the industry are, however, collected from the wild of …
Considering the shortage of medicinal plants and the need to sustain ism, cultivation and sustainable harvesting of plants from the wild has become absolutely necessary. One way of solving the problem would be to encourage cultivation by small farmers and tribal people and make big manufacturers of herbal products source …
Realising the importance of medicinal plants in the health care system available to the poor people, the department of family welfare of the mohfw started the vanaspati van yojna as part of the reproductive and child health programme in October 1997. In other words, it means converting large areas of …
Three hours from Madurai is Shenbaha Thopu. Rich in forest wealth, the peripheries of the forests are inhabited by 24 families of the Pallyan community who have traditionally been involved in the collection of non-timber forest produce (ntfp). Now something else has become a part and parcel of their lives: …
the Union ministry of mines ( mom ) proposal to amend the Fifth Schedule of the Indian constitution could take away the constitutional rights of the tribal communities over lands and other natural resources in the scheduled areas. The amendment
gone are the days when scientists used to experiment on animals. Now human beings are the guinea pigs. Led by the Canada-based Rural Advancement Foundation International, a controversial Human Genome Diversity Project ( hgdp ) is now being undertaken by the Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology ( ccmb ), …
on october 18, the Supreme Court ( sc ) cleared the construction of the Sardar Sarovar Project ( ssp ) dam on the Narmada River. Construction had been stayed in 1994 following a public interest petition by the Narmada Bachao Andolan ( nba ), which the court has now dismissed. …
The Supreme Court judgement on Sardar Sarovar Project ( ssp ) has a lesson for environmentalists: if the judiciary is asked to decide between the environment and development, it will choose development. Therefore, the judges must be presented with a case that integrates the two issues. In the case of …
THE book tackles the stereotypical image long ascribed to American Indians. Anthropologist Shepard Krech III takes on the unenviable task of breaking through the myths cherished by the contemporary world. Prevailing myths portray the American Indians as extremely intelligent in dealing with nature and living in perfect harmony with their …
Since forest-dependent communities in India are amongst the poorest people, any bottom-up poverty reduction strategy will have to take forest management into account. Madhya Pradesh ( mp ) chief minister Digvijay Singh's letter to the prime minister asking for a review of the Forest Conservation Act ( fca ) has …
