The locals of Singur have assured Tata Motors of full cooperation for setting up a plant, prompting the industrial giant to consider meeting the representatives in this regard. Tata Motors has indicated it will meet Representatives of landlosers who had given land for Tata''s Nano manufacturing plant before the company withdrew from the state in 2009 following violent local protests. They were seeking higher land price besides other demands from Tatas''. "I can...

State information commissioner Vijay Kuvalekar on Monday accepted a complaint application from RTI activist Vijay Kumbhar and directed the authorities, including the district collector and the SP, Pune rural, to declare the information sought by slain whistleblower Satish Shetty on January 7. The commissioner also directed to give a copy of the report to RTI activist Arun Mane, Kumbhar said. Kumbhar had filed a complaint application, demanding declaration of all...

Over the past decade, as crops have failed year after year, 200,000 farmers have killed themselves Naryamaswamy Naik went to the cupboard and took out a tin of pesticide. Then he stood before his wife and children and drank it. "I don't know how much he had borrowed. I asked him, but he wouldn't say," Sugali Nagamma said, her tiny grandson playing at her feet. "I'd tell him: don't worry, we...

The wife of a leading Indian human rights activist who has been sent to prison for helping Maoist rebels has said she may seek "political asylum". Ilina Sen, wife of Dr Binayak Sen, told reporters that she and her family were "not feeling safe in India" after her husband's incarceration. Last month Dr Sen was found guilty of carrying messages and setting up bank accounts for the rebels. Activists say the evidence against...

In a bid to win the hearts of forest-based communities, the government will decriminalise the collection of traditional 'livelihood items' from the forests. The move comes even as a joint committee set up by the environment and tribal affairs ministries found several state governments guilty of using the three-year-old Forest Rights Act to distribute forest land to individuals. The committee, headed by Naresh Saxena, development expert and former secretary to the government...