-Down to Earth The region, with eight per cent of India’s total geographical area, has 25 per cent of India’s forest cover India’s northeastern region — comprising Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Sikkim and Tripura — is a unique biodiversity hotspot. The region, however, faces many environmental problems. Successive Indian forest surveys in 2015, 2017 and 2019 reported net deforestation of 628, 630 and 765 square kilometres in the region respectively. This...
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In its letter to Shri Hardeep Puri, civil society activists and eminent citizens press for 100 days of guaranteed employment for each individual worker in urban areas
-Press release by Peoples' Action for Employment Guarantee, dated 29th July, 2020 The present Covid -19 crisis has brought to the fore the importance of MGNREGA in providing employment to rural workers as well as to those urban workers who due to lack of employment opportunities in urban areas were forced to migrate back to their villages. The Central Government is Planning to launch an urban employment guarantee (UEG) programme at...
More »Ensuring delayed marriage requires concerted efforts to keep girls in school for longer -Sheila Vir
-The Indian Express A well-educated woman’s chances of making informed decisions and exercising greater agency in the household is monumental in breaking the cycle of poverty, ill health, as well as malnutrition. India’s Maternal Mortality Ratio (MMR) stands at 122 as per the latest Sample Registration System (SRS) bulletin from last year — a significant decline from an MMR of 556 in 1990. A parallel decrease in the prevalence of child marriage...
More »Delhi Riots: 270 Eminent Citizens Write to CM Kejriwal Urging Probe by Retired Judge
-TheWire.in The signatories have said that Delhi police have botched up the probe to “conceal the role played by BJP leaders in the communal violence”. New Delhi: Nearly 270 prominent citizens of Delhi have urged Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal to institute an independent probe under a retired judge into the communal violence in northeast Delhi in February this year. Citing six reasons for demanding such a probe, a letter by the citizens...
More »As Jaisalmer villagers fight for sacred grove, a larger question looms -Aastha Maggu
-Down to Earth Allocation of village land for the development of solar and wind parks at the cost of pasture land is detrimental for villages Residents of Devikot village in Rajasthan’s Jaisalmer district are fighting to protect a sacred grove that caters to the forage requirements of more than 35,000 large and small animals in the area. Sacred groves are areas of natural vegetation protected by village communities due to religious reasons. Historically,...
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