Oceans under threat

By Pandurang Hegde
30 Jul 2011

There are heavy pressures on coastal areas and oceans due to the unregulated developmental activity. To save the oceans, we need to put a check on marine pollution, ocean acidification and over-exploitation of marine life.

Earth’s renewable resources are under threat. Having destroyed the grasslands and forests, human actions are causing irreversible damage to the marine ecosystems. The global warming is affecting not only the arctic zones, but also the aquatic life forms in the sea.

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Making the State master of citizens

By S. G. Vombatkere
28 Jul 2011

The Aadhar project's primary aim is to bring every citizen under the watchful eyes of the state. UID will enable and support surveillance and tracking, irrespective of its declared primary aim of enabling services for the poor.

The Unique Identification (UID) project, also known as Aadhaar, has been pushed into implementation by creation of a UID Authority of India (UIDAI) in 2009. It is slated to spend Rs. 45,000 to 1,50,000 crore with a sanctioned budget of Rs. 3,000 crores without approval of Parliament. Nandan Nilekani, former CEO of Infosys Technologies, has been nominated to head the UIDAI and accorded cabinet minister rank

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Stop CDM for coal power plants

By Shankar Sharma
19 Jul 2011


It would be criminal wastage of public funding if CDM encourages more coal based power projects on the premise that the super critical technology is to be deployed in the plants. Instead, CDM in developing countries should first focus on efficiency improvements measures in generation, transmission, distribution and utilization of electricity and locally available renewable energy sources.

The Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), under the patronage of United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), was adopted by most countries as one of the global response to reduce global warming. It permits industrialized countries (Annex 1 countries under Kyoto Protocol) to earn emission credits through investment in sustainable development projects that reduce overall Green House Gas (GHG) emissions in developing countries.

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The last hope of common man

By Devinder Sharma
12 Jul 2011


In recent times, the Supreme Court has given some crucial judgements to curb the anti-people policies being pushed by governments in the name of development and growth. Considering the abject surrender of policymakers and media before the corrupt, judicial activism remains the only hope for the marginalised Indians.

In a series of judgements that have challenged the mainline economic thinking, the country’s highest court has struck at the very foundation of India’s growth story. Moving a step ahead of simple diagnosis and introspection, the Supreme Court has taken on the responsibility of cleaning the mess.

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Deceptive intervention for millets

By Biju Negi
12 Jul 2011

Since time immemorial farmers of Uttarakhand have been growing several nutritious varieties of millets without using any external or chemical inputs. But now the government, under influence of agri-business, is making them dependent on harmful chemicals and costly commercial seeds.

This is organic, officially organic Uttarakhand, and the state Agriculture Department is having ‘minikits’ of chemical fertilizers and micro-nutrients distributed free to its small farmers. Quietly, almost secretly!
These free minikits are part of the “Initiative for Nutritional Security through Intensive Millets Promotion (INSIMP)”, beginning current kharif season in the six districts of Uttarakhand – Pauri, Tehri, Uttarkashi, Chamoli, Rudraprayag and Almora.

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Carbon Crunching

By Sudhirendar Sharma
06 Jul 2011

The World Bank has signed an agreement with the state government of Himachal Pradesh for the largest carbon revenue project. However, the conditions of the agreement indicate that instead of putting the carbon revenue mechanism to the competitive advantage of the stakeholders, such projects continue to serve the interest of the clients.

Tucked up in the middle Himalayas, farmers in the mountainous state of Himachal Pradesh will crunch atmospheric carbon to help rid the Spaniards of their climate woes. In the next two decades, 839,582 tons of carbon dioxide equivalents are likely to be sequestered in over 4,000 hectares of variedly degraded agriculture and forest land in the state.

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Increasing prosperity, disappearing girls

By Pandurang Hegde
30 Jun 2011


Contrary to popularly held opinion, the female to male ratio is on decline despite continuous economic growth in India. Curiously, the backward regions with poor education seem to be doing better on child sex ratio in comparison to the better-off areas.

The provisional Census figures released recently brought relief to experts as they saw the marginal decline in the rate of population growth. This euphoria is short lived as the dissection of the census data revealed a shocking feature of declining child sex ratios (CSR). Though there was marginal improvement in the adult sex ratio, it was obvious that the girls were missing from the populations not only in the northern regions, but also in new areas including in the prosperous urban regions of the country.

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