-Hindustan Times New Delhi: During his routine morning jogs, Vardhaman Kaushik often felt his stamina was going down. The young environment lawyer choked on what he felt was highly toxic air. In February 2014, he moved the National Green Tribunal (NGT) for relief. He didn't expect his ‘innocuous petition' will escalate to the level it now has, and result in a ban for all petrol vehicles older than 15 years and diesel...

-India Today "The butterflies will show you the way to the farm." Farmer Sunil Gupta is not talking of mythical butterflies that will appear to guide me to the organic farm I am trying to locate amidst swathes of farmland, some lush with the standing paddy, some damaged in parts from last week's strong winds, others dotted with vegetable patches or freshly ploughed for the next crop. Can one tell an organic...

-Hindustan Times The government plans to relax child labour laws and allow children below the age of 14 to work in select family enterprises if it doesn't hamper their education, saying it wants to encourage learning at home as it leads to entrepreneurship. A draft provision in the Child Labour Prohibition Act says the prohibition on child labour will not apply if they are helping the family in fields, forests and home-based...

-TheWeekendLeader.com/ Women's Feature Service Radha Shukla, 43, can't really remember the last time she took a holiday. "It's been so long since I have celebrated a festival with my family or even taken leave. But I don't mind it; my work is important," she says emphatically. To Shanta Koshti, 50, the years she spent as a poorly-paid ‘beedi' worker seem like another lifetime. "At present, my entire focus is on motivating people...

-Newsclick.in The government in India continues to kow-tow to corporate lobbies at the cost of the environment and public health including occupational health. While always an integral part of ruling class politics in India, as witnessed in the seemingly never-ending saga of the Bhopal Gas Disaster, this has reached new heights under the BJP government led by PM Narendra Modi which is rapidly dismantling even the already weak environmental regulatory structure....