The Supreme Court has condemned the stripping and parading of a tribal woman by four upper-caste men 17 years ago, citing it as an example of how tribals are systemically ill-treated and “marginalised” in India. The accused had dismissed the evidence of the victim’s torn clothes claiming that she and other Bhils were poor and usually wore tattered clothes. “This itself shows the mentality of the accused who regard tribal people as...

The Environment and Forests Ministry was in news throughout 2010 -- be it for Vedanta Resources, Posco and Lavasa -- or for Jairam Ramesh's aggressive green activism. While the ministry rejected the green signal to Vedanta for its $1.7 billion project to mine bauxite in the Niyamgiri Hills of Orissa noting that the company violated the environment and forests rules, it put the $12 billion project by South Korean steelmaker Posco...

Nearly 100 days after the nondescript Tembhali in Nandurbar district was swamped with promises of development, nothing has changed for the better in the tribal village. For over a week in September, the tribal village basked in public and official attention. Prime minister Manmohan Singh and UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi landed to launch the ambitious Unique Identity (UID) card — Aadhaar — project amid great fanfare. Great promises to improve the...

The world's third-largest steel maker Posco has said the company is running out of patience over its long delayed Rs 54,000-crore steel project in Orissa and may have to take a final call in the near future. The 12-million-tonne-per annum project has been stuck for the last five years and with an environment ministry panel recommending cancellation of its forest clearance proposal last year, the impasse seems endless. "The government has to...

After visits to 17 states, a committee set up in April last year to check out the implementation of India’s Forest Rights Act, meant to fix “historical injustice,” wasn’t very happy. The law, which came into full effect two years ago, was intended to assert the rights of forest dwellers more firmly. “The overall finding of the committee is that, with notable exceptions, the implementation of the FRA has been poor,...