-The Times of India Politicians involved with the National Committee in Solidarity with Jaitapur Struggle have written to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh seeking cancellation of the contract with French company Areva for supplying nuclear reactors to the project. The letter, written by CPM general secretary Prakash Karat, senior leader Sitaram Yechury, CPI leaders AB Bardhan and D Raja, Lok Janshakti Party chief Ramvilas Paswan, JD (S) leader Danish Ali and Telugu Desam...

-The Hindustan Times In June 1992, Manmohan Singh, then finance minister in the Government of India, delivered the Foundation Day Address of the Society for Promotion of Wastelands Development (SPWD). He spoke on the topic ‘Environment and the New Economic Policies’. In his talk, Singh urged “objective standards industry-wise for safeguarding the environment, asking industry to certify compliance with these standards, institution of an effective system of verification and industry audit...

-The Hindustan Times There is good news for the Himachal Pradesh Power Corporation Ltd (HPPCL), the executing agency of the Renuka dam project, with the National Green Tribunal giving a green signal to the acquisition of land for the project. Vacating an interim stay ordered by it on July 28 last year on the land acquisition for the Rs 3,600-crore Renuka dam project, the tribunal has allowed the HPPCL to consider...

-The Hindu Environment Ministry rejected forest clearance to Kalu dam in Thane district While irregularities were surfacing in irrigation projects around Mumbai in early April, the Forest Advisory Committee (FAC) of the Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF) rejected forest clearance to the Kalu dam in Murbad taluka of Thane district, which would have submerged around 1,000 hectares of forest land. Work started last October without permission from the MOEF, and Indavi Tulpule...

Reluctance to make reports public could erode public confidence in government’s decisions, says CIC The Central Information Commission (CIC) has directed India’s nuclear power plant operator to publicize safety analysis reports of the Kudankulam atomic power plant within a month. In a contentious two-year dispute between environmentalists and the nuclear power establishment, the apex information commission, in an order on its website, has said that the reluctance to make the reports public...