-Women's Feature Service The ‘gola' or grain basket, built on elevated ground in Goyadham village in Sunderban's South 24 Parganas district, West Bengal, is central to the food security of several households here. As Sofia Bibi, 45, says, "The grain is protected from the recurrent flooding and storms and we are ensured of a regular supply when there is no agricultural work during the months of September to November and March to...

-The Times of India KOLKATA: The West Bengal Mineral Development & Trading Corporation Ltd will acquire around 2,800 hectares of land for three coal blocks in Burdwan, one of the largest land acquisitions by any state-run agency since Trinamool Congress came to power in Bengal in May 2011. The corporation-which has already been pulled up by the coal ministry for delay in the project's execution-needs to take 1186.83 hectares for the Ichhapur...

-The Hindustan Times Bhubaneswar/Hyderabad: At least four more people have been killed and 66,000 evacuated as the flood situation worsened in Odisha following incessant rain in most parts of the state for the fifth consecutive day on Friday. The continuous downpour has added to the suffering of the people after Cyclone Phailin hit the beach town of Gopalpur in Ganjam on the night of October 12 with a wind speed of more...

-The Hindustan Times Mumbai: Indian companies have acquired land more than nine times the size of Delhi on foreign shores, as cultivable land at home is lost to urbanisation, industry and infrastructure projects. Land Matrix, a global land monitoring initiative that tracks land dealings worldwide, placed India among the top 10 countries that have acquired large tracts of land abroad, primarily for agriculture, in Africa and Asia. The country ranks eighth,...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: With the World Heath Organization's (WHO) International Agency for Research on Cancer declaring air pollution as a major cause of cancer, its findings have put the focus on Indian hotspots like Delhi, West Bengal, Maharashtra and Jharkhand which showed high concentration of life-threatening air pollutants. Air quality data of the government's pollution watchdog, Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB), for 2010 - the last one in the...