-IPS News KARNAL, India: United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon is expected to make a strong pitch to world political leaders at the U.N. Climate Summit in New York on Sep. 23 to accept new emissions targets and their timelines. Launching the Global Alliance for Climate-Smart Agriculture (CSA) represents yet another concerted attempt to meet the world's 60-percent higher food requirement over the next 35 years, according to the Food and Agriculture...

-The Hindu The Odisha government has made the right announcements to improve the plight of migrant workers, but a lot more needs to be done In December 2013, a labourer chopped off the palms of two migrant workers from western Odisha. He had paid them an advance for working in the brick kilns of Hyderabad and did not take kindly to their arguing with him about the payment and place of work....

-Down to Earth Tribal affairs minister asked to withdraw objections to Maharashtra's Village Forest Rules that allow forest department take control over forests in violation of FRA The Forest Rights Act (FRA), which protects the rights of tribal people and forest dwellers over their forests, is under fire like never before. Multiple ministries in the ruling National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government are putting pressure on the Union Ministry of Tribal Affairs (MoTA)...

-The Business Standard Ministers in the Narendra Modi government have been busy making presentations on their 100 days of work. But what these presentations do not mention is that decisions by ministers have been few, with plenty of papers and files moving to the Prime Minister's Office (PMO), which is increasingly emerging as a centralised clearance point, even for routine and ordinary issues. Though policy paralysis was a term used freely...

-The Business Standard Forest Rights Act being reinterpreted to avoid amendment Led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi's office, the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government is discussing possible ways to do away with the mandatory requirement of securing consent from tribal gram sabhas (village councils) before cutting down their forests for industrial purposes. The deliberations, on among various ministries, are for zeroing in on such a way that the requirement is removed without...