India has opposed ban on the pesticide at Geneva meet, Forest Minister says India should not have become a ‘spokesman' of the pesticides lobby. Forest Minister Benoy Viswom has criticised the stand taken by India against global ban on Endosulfan at the sixth meeting of Persistent Organic Pollutants Review Committee to the Stockholm Convention at Geneva last week. “India's stand was not right. The general consensus at the meeting was in favour...

Spurred by the need to look at impact of climate change on water resources, the Centre is formulating a revised National Water Policy in consultation with the States and other stakeholders to ensure basin-level management strategies to deal with variability in rainfall and river flows due to climate change. Ecology over industry? The government is also looking at amendment to the Inter-State Water Disputes Act, and the River Boards Act for time-bound...

It will develop blueprint to achieve ‘health for all' by 2020 Recognising the Importance of defining a comprehensive strategy for universal health coverage, the Planning Commission has set up a high level expert group to develop a blueprint and investment plan for meeting the human resource requirements to achieve ‘health for all' by 2020. The 15-member high level group on universal health coverage, chaired by K. Srinath Reddy, president of the Public...

Our right to know includes the right to know what we eat. We live in a transgenic age, one in which it is no longer sufficient for food labelling to stop with listing such things as nutritional values, chemical additives, and possible allergens. Although there is no evidence that approved genetically modified food is unsafe for human consumption, people have the right to choose not to eat it for ideological,...

The First ever Kui Music Album ‘Niyamgiri ti Rani’ was launched here at Mayfair, Bhubaneswar on 19th October, 2010. This is one-of-its kind initiative in the country to bring the beauty, the rich cultural heritage, their music and language to the limelight. The Dongria Kondhas are one of the primitive tribal inhabitants of Lanjigarh, in the district of Kalahandi. Kui, the traditional language of the Dongria Kondhas, has a rich oral...