First food: a taste of India’s biodiversity
This collection of around 100 recipes from different parts of the country brings to life the magic that takes place once biodiversity is combined with culinary dexterity.
Sunita Narain
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The mean world of climate change
The Prime Minister has released India's national action plan on climate change. For those engaged in the business of environment and climate, the plan may offer nothing new or radical. But, as I see it, the plan asserts India can grow differently, because "it is in an early stage of development'. In other words, it can leapfrog to a low carbon economy, using high-end and emerging technologies and by being different.
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Stink of India's steel frame
We were standing in Sarova village, not far from Raipur, the capital of mineral-rich Chhattisgarh. All around us we could see some black stuff scattered on the ground. The villagers told us that the sponge iron factory owner was giving this away as a 'gift' and would even transport it to their lands. They refused to say if they were being paid to dump this reject on their land. But they did whisper to me that the land on which we were standing, laden with black reject belonged to the brother of the sarpanch. The sarpanch they said was earlier against the factory's pollution.
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Sunita Narain: The mean world of climate
DOWN TO EARTH Sunita Narain / New Delhi July 04, 2008, 0:00 IST We need a way ahead
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From water to water (Editorial)
Look out of the window the next time you travel by road or by train anywhere in India. Hit a human settlement, and you will see, heaps of plastic coloured garbage apart, pools of dirty black water and drains that go nowhere. They go nowhere because we have forgotten a basic fact: if there are humans, there will be excreta. Indeed, we have also forgotten another truth about the so-called modern world: if there is water use, there will be waste. Roughly 80 per cent of the water that reaches households flows out as waste.
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Rotten steel frame of development
Sunita Narain India thrives on a cheap and dirty industrialisation model.
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NREGA delivers a mixed bag
Sandip Das Launched in February 2006, UPA government's mega National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA), which for the first time guaranteed 100 days of manual labour to each rural household, continue to make news for all the right as well as wrong reasons. Initially launched in the 200 backward districts as identified by the Planning Commission, the impact of NREGA has been a mixed bag.
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Frugality is not poverty
The duty on buses which carry more people is the same as that on small cars, such is our warped policy. After much vacillation and prevarication, the government has finally done the inevitable
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Sunderbans: going, going, gone
Estuarine mangrove forests are a priceless environmental, cultural and aesthetic legacy. And ours have begun to drown
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Delhi, UP sign pact for a smooth bus ride after 23 yrs
The bus commuters plying between Delhi and Uttar Pradesh can now look forward to an easy journey. The Delhi and Uttar Pradesh Governments signed an agreement on Monday, which would facilitate free movement of vehicles in each other's territory. "Better connectivity between NCR in UP and Delhi and free movement of commercial vehicles of the NCR States like Delhi, Haryana, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh will now be possible. This is a historic agreement signed after 23 years," said Delhi Transport Minister Haroon Yusuf.
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Agreement paves way for seamless traffic
The draft transport agreement between the UP and Delhi governments is a step ahead for the Environmental Pollution (Prevention and Control) Authority appointed by the Supreme Court to monitor government projects with the aim of preventing pollution by decongesting the city. Stating that for interstate public transport, nothing short of CNG would be allowed in the NCR, EPCA chairman Bhure Lal said the idea behind the agreement was not just to facilitate movement but also to get more people to use public transport.