Judgment of the Supreme Court in the matter of In Re: Zudpi Jungle Lands. A batch of applications involved a peculiar issue concerning the situation prevailing in the six districts of eastern Vidarbha region namely Nagpur, Wardha, Bhandara, Gondia, Chandrapur and Gadchiroli. The issue pertains to the status of the …
Can earthquakes be forecast? After investing one billion dollars in a 30-year earthquake prediction programme, Japanese scientists have virtually admitted failure (Nature, Vol 358 No 6835). A recent review of the programme by Japanese officials indicated several abnormal phenomena could not be objectively identified as quake precursors. For instance, earthquake …
A SEXUALLY abused child is more vulnerable to vitimisation as an adult such torture in childhood, said Shodha Srinath, assistant professor at the National Institute of Mental Health and Neurological Sciences in Bangalore. Srinath was speaking at a seminar on child rape, organised in New Delhi by the National Commission …
WITH DEPLETION of groundwater heavy in many parts of the country and rich farmers almost monopolising water resources, the Union government is renewing efforts to get states to control groundwater extraction. Last month, the water resources ministry circulated a model bill on groundwater use, making obtaining of permits compulsory and …
Thanks to the foresight of an American plant collector 20 years ago, several bean varieties are today resistant to a pest scientists had given up trying to control. During a trip to southern Mexico, H S Gentry recognised a wild vine considered a useless weed was, in fact, a wild …
IN JUST two years, India's sesame seed exports have fallen dramatically -- by more than 75 per cent. While the government says this is due to higher prices in the domestic market, oilseed exporters contend it is because residues of banned pesticides have been detected in sesame seeds by importing …
The belief that more girls die of diseases because of neglect is not necessarily true, according to a study of measles in rural Senegal. The study suggests the severity of the disease is determined by the nature of infection and the sex of the person who transmitted it (The Lancet, …
Scientists at the US National Soil Erosion Research Laboratory have developed a portable laser scanner than can accurately measure soil roughness, a key determinant of erosion. The laser scans the microscopic ridges in the soil and transmits the data to a computer that produces a microtopographic map of the area. …
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 …
THE NATIONAL Environment Tribunal Bill (NET) introduced in the recent monsoon session of Parliament, aims at providing a mechanism for speedy compensation of victims of industrial disasters. The bill was introduced by the government after rejecting a proposal to set up environmental courts in the country. The bill states it …
A TUSSLE over registration procedures for two new kinds of pesticides that could form the cornerstone of India's malaria eradication programme has ended, but the question of which one will be used is likely to be decided only much later, and this is adversely affecting the malaria eradication programme. The …
RICE AS grown in India is a water-guzzler, because farmers use on an average 15,000 litres to produce one kg of paddy, though water technologists at the Indian Agricultural Research Institute in New Delhi say no more than 600 litres is needed if proper water management techniques are followed. Given …
Increasing instances of theft of plant species from Asian countries led delegates at a recent symposium of botanists in New Delhi to stress the need to recognise the importance of taxonomy - the science of classifying organisms. The UNESCO-sponsored meet was organised by Botany 2000-Asia, a network of Asian botanists. …
THE AMOUNT of rain falling in various parts of India has changed over the years, decreasing in some places and increasing in others. K Rupa Kumar and his colleagues at the Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology (IITM) in Pune report in a recent issue of the International Journal of Climatology …
IT IS A daring and formidable task to synthesise the insights of social and physical anthropology, physiology, epidemiology, micro-economics and macro-economics. This has been attempted with considerable success in this book by focussing primarily on survival strategies of rural households in "developing" countries in the face of both chronic and …
I WONDER how many people know that practically none of the country's forest departments has any women field staff? A few women have got into the Indian Forest Service by passing the all- India entrance tests, but they belong to the elite officer cadre, and do not ordinarily interact with …
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 …
"ONE BY one each of the girls answered my questions. What was their name and age? What do they do during the day? What do their parents do? Had they ever been to school and for how long? The children were remarkably articulate. Half of the children had been to …
THIS ORGANISATION (Council for Advancement of People's Action and Rural Technology or CAPART) has two elements. One is to advance people's action. This is not new at all... From time immemorial our rural societies have had a very great amount of autonomy built into their functioning. Whether it was a …
DOMESTIC critics of the country's nuclear programme campaign as stridently against it abroad as they do at home. With considerable help from some of them, Yorkshire TV, one of the ITV companies in UK, recently telecast an hour-long documentary entitled Nuclear India -- A Dream Gone Sour. Unfortunately, accusatory quotes …
How did you join the sangha? One day Venkates from Gramashrama came to the coir factory for a pooja. I asked him who he was. My friend Shankar was already a member and because I did not go to school, I decided to join. What do you get out of …
