The pesticide is the point
In February, we released a study on pesticide residues in bottled water being sold in the market. We reported how we found legalised pesticides in bottled water. In other words, the norms for
Filters
- Opinion
Search Results
-
-
June 30, 2003: The day conservation policy could have changed
Usually, the Union ministry of environment and forests MoEF does manage to stick to its guns in the face of adversity, or even rationality. But June 30, 2003 has changed all that. In a media statement, the director general of forests declared that the M
-
A thing of beauty
It is a wonder! The amount of mudslinging the Taj Mahal provokes, it is surely impossible for this matchless mound of white marble to remain spotless. This time, the issue is construction behind the Taj and reclaiming a part of the Yamuna riverbed for the
-
Why is rain a tragedy for cities?
A few days ago, most of India reeled under drought. Cities thirsted for water. Karnataka s chief minister S M Krishna seeing water supply in his software capital reduced to once in three days
-
Debating GM crops: Let sound science, and so good sense, inform it
The Paris based International Council for Science, a federation of more than 100 national science academies, has come out with the biggest review of scientific literature on genetically modified crops. The review provides guarantee: GM foods presently in
-
Killing the high-end killer
I first learnt that smoke from chulhas was deadly when Kirk Smith, then a professor at the East West Centre in Hawaii, visited our office in the early 1980s. He came with a handheld smoke monitor
-
The monsoon always catches the government unawares
First there was the mounting suspense. All of India awaited with bated breath the arrival of the south west monsoon. Would it arrive? Miraculously, politicians went into intricate calculations: would the bounty be enough to sustain the GDP growth projecte
-
Rain check
The column width dedicated to rain in the mainstream print media has hit an all time high. A few days ago, television news reporters with that special ability to capture and re create frenzy planted themselves on Kerala s beaches, not chasing a vacation
-
Puritanism will not cure AIDS
Union health minister Sushma Swaraj is brandishing a new poultice to wrap around the AIDS menace. It is a purifying prescription called abstinence . Don t have sex, you won t have AIDS. The health minister doesn t like the way AIDS prevention programmes
-
A foreign vocabulary
Why are we, as a nation, so non serious about following through on actions? Is it the curse of a foreign language in which we act, but not think, that we pick up words and so believe the deed, too,
-
Avoiding harm how simple a duty is it?
The London High Court judgment on arsenic poisoning cases in Bangladesh explicity clears the way for affected people to claim compensation. Implicity, it raises other issues of far reaching consequence
-
Waste, by any other name...
An official of the state government was explaining, at a meeting, the progress made to set up sewage treatment plants, drains and diversionary sewers in pursuit of a Supreme Court order to clean up
-
No case for a multilateral framework
<font class='UCASE'>Nagesh Kumar</font> , director general of Research and Information Systems on Non Aligned and Developing Countries, a development research organisation, talks to <font class='UCASE'>Clifford Polycarp</font> about investment issues in
-
No more symbolism There will be peace in Kashmir
Unfortunately, the very institutions that profess this belief are the ones blocking its realisation. Consider the recent prime ministerial visit to the state. Vajpayee went, he saw, he wished to conquer the media. He spoke about unemployment, and promised
-
A lesson not learnt
Five successive years of debilitating drought. It had rained for barely a few hours last year in the region of Rajasthan I was visiting. I expected wasted lands, desolation and nearly abandoned
-
Does government know one ecotourism from another?
<font class="UCASE">is the </font> Andaman Works Department (<font class="UCASE">awd</font>) an expert body on eco-tourism?
-
People can save on electricity bills
N K Bansal, of Centre for Energy Studies, Indian Institute of Technology, New Delhi talks to TV Jayan on energy efficiency
-
No truck with reason
It's a clear sell out. The Union ministry of road transport and highways MRTH has given ground to truckers who ended their strike recently: the striking truckers had demanded a waiver on the proposed Mumbai High Court ban on 15 year old commercial vehic
-
Ordering a new world
I met Jacques Chirac this fortnight. Just before he made the call to George Bush and just before he left to attend the European Union summit in Athens, the French president met some 20 of us in his
-
The shadow of a calamity
Among disasters, drought is the easiest to predict and manage. The Indian Meteorological Department s forecast of a below normal monsoon in 2003 a full six weeks in advance has sent out a terse warning: prepare to drought proof the country. Coming a