-The Economic Times Vedanta's alumina project in Odisha's Lanjigarh will be stuck for at least five more months, with the Supreme Court today referring the controversial issue of mining the nearby Niyamgiri hills back to the gram sabhas. A bench, comprising justices Aftab Alam, K.S. Radhakrishnan and Ranjan Gogoi, said that the issue of tribal rights, especially their religious rights, had not been determined before grant of permission to mine the hills...

-Civil Society Online Accreditation is the act of granting credit or recognition. It is to be preceded with a process where facts, figures and professional ethics are scrutinized so that the desired certification of competency, authority or credibility is presented. Only the best suited with the requisite track record are to find themselves in the approved list. In India, the much talked about and well critiqued initiative wherein consultants undertaking the responsibility...

-The Indian Express Chennai: The fate of Sterlite Industries, and that of thousands of people of coastal Tuticorin, now depends on the south bench of the National Green Tribunal, which is hearing the company's petition against its closure ordered by the Tamil Nadu Pollution Control Board (TNPCB). The biggest copper smelting unit in the country, part of the Vedanta Group, moved the tribunal after the TNPCB ordered closure of the plant following...

-The Hindu   The government does it purely on the strength of a certificate issued by the district administration Even as the recent affidavit submitted by the Union Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF) before the Supreme Court in the Vedanta case has caused dismay among tribal communities and activists for the dilution of its stand on diverting forest lands of tribal communities, the Ministry has gone a step further and allowed diversion...

-PTI The Supreme Court on Tuesday asked Sterlite Industries, a subsidiary of U.K.-based Vedanta Group, to pay Rs. 100 crore as compensation for polluting environment through its copper smelting plant in Tamil Nadu but refused to direct its closure. A bench headed by Justice A.K. Patnaik said that the environment has been polluted for a long time due to the discharge from the plant of the multinational company and it has...