Women-led and women’s rights organizations are on the frontlines of today’s humanitarian crises—but many are at risk of disappearing. As global needs rise due to conflict, climate change, and displacement, deep cuts to foreign aid are threatening organizations that provide life-saving services for women and girls. In March 2025, UN …
Demanding to be heard: Following violence and lathicharge, the venue of public hearing was deserted, but the hearing was not cancelled. (Below) People blocked roads in protest after their objections were not heard at the meeting Violence during the public hearing for Jindal group's coal mine in Raigarh district of …
An innovative Australian play highlights the dire status of Australia's indigenous people. Ngapartji Ngapartji, staged at the Sydney Theatre festival held in the third week of January, is based on the forced removal of people from their traditional land in the Central Desert for British atomic weapons testing during the …
Traditionally most urban areas in the country have grown out of rural settlements. Land use changes and population growth have precipitated urbanization in a lot of rural centres. Urbanization also has cultural connotations, more so today with the far reaching impacts of globalization. But there is another important aspect today: …
Just a few days after an Indonesian court rejected a lawsuit brought by environmental groups against an energy company alleged to have caused mud volcano in Sidoarjo district, hot and black sludge from the volcano started flowing again. Heavy monsoon rains have exacerbated the mud flow causing dams surrounding the …
The Sierra Leone government has called for an inquiry into the unrest over diamond-mining operations in the eastern district of Kono, where residents were killed during protests in the second week of December, 2007. The government has asked the mining company, Koidu Holdings, to suspend its operations in Kono's Koidu …
some people in Orissa's Jagatsinghpur district, in a complete turnaround from their earlier stand, agreed to give up land for the posco steel plant on January 5, but with conditions. They have asked for a 5 per cent share in the profits of the company, among other demands. In another …
The multi-crore Polavaram project in Andhra Pradesh is currently embroiled in legal issues. But now, the project is being contested on technical issues as well. A study carried out by the International Water Management Institute (iwmi), an international non-profit research and development organization, has questioned the fundamental basis on which …
January 2, 2006. At least 13 tribal people and a policeman were killed in a clash at the Kalinganagar steel complex in Orissa's Jajpur district. The tribal people were protesting the construction of a boundary wall for a proposed mega steel plant by Tata Steel when the violence broke out …
on january 1, 2008, the government after much vacillation notified the rules of Scheduled Tribes and Other Tradi- tional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act. The day before, it had notified "critical tiger habitats' in 28 existing and eight proposed tiger reserves. It scored on both tiger conservation and …
From the highway the gravestones were visible. Thirteen headstones, rough and blunt, carved with names of each dead tribal. Each stone was placed so that together they formed a semi-circle looking down at us. In front of the 13-stone platform was a fenced area with scattered burnt sticks lying as …
On the first anniversary of a historic court judgment, the Bushman organization First People of the Kalahari released an open letter to Botswana President Festus Mogae, detailing the ways in which the government is still preventing them from returning to their ancestral land. On December 13, 2006, the Bushmen won …
An argument over a Valentine's Day gift leads shubhranshu choudhary to the politics of an aluminium ladder On the eve of Valentine's Day, a friend of my son persuades me to take my wife "out for dinner and buy her a nice gift'. I thank her for the idea but …
Much to the Andhra Pradesh government's dismay, the National Environmental Appellate Authority has quashed the environmental clearance for the state's multi-crore Indira Sagar Project, formerly known as the Polavaram Irrigation Project. In a historic ruling on December 19, the authority for the first time took into consideration the fact that …
The report examines the nature and extent of development-induced displacement in Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand and Orissa. More than 40 percent of India's indigenous people live in this zone. Breaching all measures to protect the rights of these communities as guaranteed by the Constitution of India, the respective governments have …
The "tigers vs. tribals' debate is getting murkier. The Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Bill 2006, passed by Parliament, does not do much to clear the air on whether the bill will aid or undermine conservation. This bill is very belated. Forest-dwelling communities have …
This article outlines some key elements of a human-rights based approach to the compulsory acquisition of land. It shows that the compulsory acquisition of land often proceeds rapidly where the political, economic and legal power of those affected directly is weakest. While expropriation should be a powerful and beneficial tool …
In the last year, Special Economic Zones (SEZs) were a much discussed issue. Most of the discussion focused on two issues, viz. (a) the acquisition of land, rehabilitation, the consequences for farmers and agricultural output, and (b) the cost of the various tax benefits provided to developers of SEZs and …
A total amount of Rs 12790 lacs have been sanctioned and disbursed which included compensation of land and property amounting Rs. 8255.64 lacs, special rehabilitation grant amounting Rs 1960.36 lacs and rehabilitation grant amounting Rs 2574 lacs.
Twenty-six years ago, people displaced by the Supa dam were resettled in Karnataka's Uttara Kannada district. The better irrigation facilities promised to them after they were relocated in the district's Ramnagar panchayat haven't materialized. They still face an uncertain future. The people are not allowed to use water from the …
