-Press release by Housing and Land Rights Network (HLRN) dated 9th September, 2021 Housing and Land Rights Network (HLRN), today, released its new report on forced evictions in India. Titled, Forced Evictions in India in 2020: A Grave Human Rights Crisis During the Pandemic, this report presents comprehensive data and an analysis of forced evictions and demolitions of homes of the urban and rural poor across the country in 2020. It...

-Science.thewire.in * In the near-term, the IPCC report reaffirms that India can no longer afford to ignore the very real developmental challenge that climate change poses at home. * In a significant development, the government’s statement contains a clear and welcome acknowledgement of the relationship between climate change and extreme events. * To embark on a low-carbon development pathway, however, India will need an institutional architecture with a more strategic bent. “It is unequivocal...

-Down to Earth blog The ecology of Himachal Pradesh’s hydropower hub is too fragile for such projects “Twenty-five years ago, people could be excused for not knowing much, or doing much about climate change. Today, we have no excuses,” Desmond Tutu, South African theologian, had said. The recent landslides in Himachal Pradesh's Kinnaur district brought back focus on how 40 per cent of the state is geologically ‘highly sensitive’, according to a report...

-TheWire.in It has been proven time and again that large 'development' projects, involving the blasting of fragile hills and constraining the flow of rivers, cause huge loss of lives and livelihoods in the Himalayan region. Two big landslides in the Kinnaur district of Himachal Pradesh which made national headlines have re-emphasised the need for ecologically protective development in geologically fragile and vulnerable hills. On August 11, a massive landslide on National Highway 5,...

-TheWire.in R. Ramakumar, a professor at the School of Development Studies, Tata Institute of Social Sciences, has said the Narendra Modi government simply can’t meet its target of vaccinating every adult by the end of the year. According to him, this is both because the supply of vaccines will be nowhere near sufficient and, second, because the vaccination rate can’t rise to the level required to meet the target. He listed eight...