Latehar, Hazaribagh and Gumla in Jharkhand, Bastar in Chhattisgarh, Chandrapur in Maharashtra, the Jaintia Hills in Meghalaya… the list goes on. These are all districts in India where mining companies are locked in a battle with the local population over the mining rights in these regions. Other than fighting mining companies, there are two factors common to all these regions. One, they have fertile land and dense forests. Two, indigenous tribes...

An illiterate tribal woman from Orissa's Jagatsinghpur district is all set to play a vital role in deciding the fate of the Rs 51,000 crore Posco steel project, billed as the country's biggest FDI. The role of Meena Hembram and 20 others came to limelight after the Meena Gupta panel, which submitted its reports to the union Ministry of Environment and Forest (MoEF) on October 18, pointed out that there were...

Orissa Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik today said the POSCO project, which has been a hanging fire for the last five years, has a potential of earning huge revenue for the Centre as well as the state and will create many employment opportunities for the country. Patnaik also said the implementaion of the Rs 51,000-crore project is also the responsibility of the central government. "It is also the responsibility of the Centre. The...

The Posco tale got another twist on Thursday with the environment ministry's forest advisory committee deciding to rethink whether it should ask the ministry of tribal affairs to verify the violations of Forest Rights Act or it should do so itself. In a meeting held on October 25, the FAC had concluded that it would recommend that the tribal affairs ministry take a final call on whether the Orissa government had...

Directing the forest officials not to demolish the huts of the tribals and other forest dwellers in Khammam agency area, Justice C V Ramulu of the AP High Court on Wednesday made absolute a stay that was imposed earlier on such forcible evictions. The judge made this order while hearing a petition filed by the forest range officers of VR Puram and other areas of Khammam district who wanted the court...