Tribal people constitute close to 50 per cent of the population that has been displaced because of "developmental" activities. “IF you are to suffer, you should suffer in the interest of the country,” Jawaharlal Nehru has been quoted as telling the village residents to be displaced by the Hirakud dam in 1948. And so it has been for the past 64 years. People, mostly impoverished tribes, have been suffering because...

The farmers' agitation in Uttar Pradesh brings into focus the indiscriminate acquisition of land by the state for corporate-led development. ON May 19, three days before the formal observation of the second anniversary of the United Progressive Alliance government, Congress president and UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi made a categorical announcement that in the monsoon session of Parliament scheduled to begin in July the ruling coalition would bring in legislation that...

P.V. RAJAGOPAL and Ekta Parishad, the non-governmental organisation he leads, have been championing the cause of land and forest rights of tribal and Dalit communities over the past two decades. The organisation is committed to non-violent, Gandhian forms of struggle and has recorded a number of success stories in ensuring and legitimising the land rights of deprived people, particularly in Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Bihar and Orissa. In this interview to...

-The Times of India   Babli Devi can finally hope for justice if the CBI inquiry into her husband's death comes to fruition. The wife of the MGNREGA workerSubal Mahto, allegedly killed for asking for his wages after digging a well, has welcomed the proposal of a CBI inquiry by the Centre. The 50-year-old resident of Bhatua village of Bokaro had died on February 19 after being thrashed by his contractor...

Renu Devi is scared. The Planning Commission’s new definition of poverty will eject her from the set of below-poverty-line households, and her family will lose the right to 25kg rice and wheat a month at Rs 5 per kilo. The plan panel has fixed a cut-off of Rs 675 and Rs 870 as the monthly per head expenditure, in rural and urban areas respectively, for a family to qualify as poor....