Indigenous knowledge and farming practices of the region's tribal people recognised for promoting food security and conserving biodiversity Traditional farming systems in India have received a major boost at a time when Indian agriculture is struggling to come to terms with modern technologies. The Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) of the United Nations has accorded the status of Globally Important Agricultural Heritage System (GIAHS) to the traditional agricultural system being practiced...

-The Telegraph   Tamil Nadu chief minister Jayalalithaa today joined the chorus against the entry of foreign capital in multi-brand retail, saying the Centre’s decision that smacked of “overweening arrogance” would affect the livelihood of millions of small-time traders. In Delhi, the under-fire UPA brought out a full-page ad in newspapers that said the move would “generate 10 million new jobs” contrary to the “mistaken belief” that it would result in widespread unemployment. The...

The floodgates have opened on a movie ominously titled DAM999, which some political parties in Tamil Nadu feel is toeing the line of neighbouring Kerala in a dispute between the states. A section of Tamil Nadu politicians feels the movie, produced and directed by a Malayali businessman, relates to the controversy around the 116-year-old Mullaperiyar dam in central Kerala. Tamil Nadu holds the lease rights to the dam for 999 years...

IT IS one of the inspirational legends of Indian journalism that James Hickey, founder and editor of the Bengal Gazette — this country’s first newspaper, with its first edition going back to January 1780 — was a fearless seeker of the truth, taken to court and imprisoned by Warren Hastings, then governor-general. Reality is a little different. Hickey’s paper was often a gossipy, yellow rag. It thought nothing of publishing scurrilous...

Indian ministers' foreign travel plans have been grounded by the government's austerity drive. Till July 1 this year, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had turned down as many as 24 foreign trip applications from members of his ministerial council, compared to 10 such refusals in the whole of 2010. The change is stark considering that the PM had earlier been obliging almost all his colleagues. In 2009, after the UPA returned to...