Minister for Municipal Administration and Rural Development K.P. Munusamy on Saturday distributed Rs. 22.36 lakh as compensation to 834 farmers whose crops were damaged by wild elephants. The farmers who got the compensation cheques are from Krishnagiri, Hosur, Royakottai, Jawalagiri and Denkanikottai ranges. Four hundred and ninety nine farmers in Denkanikottai forest range, who were the worst affected, got Rs. 11,12,300. In Jawalagiri forest range 239 farmers received Rs. 7,65,950 as...

The battle against Posco appeared to be reaching a crucial stage as around 2,000 protectors today continued to block the entry of police and officials into Dhinkia and Gobindapur even as an Opposition delegation visited the area to lend support to the people’s movement. As the protesters refused to budge, the officials were forced to return empty-handed after a five-hour-long wait. The movement against the 12-million-tonne Posco steel project got a big...

-The Hindu   The land acquisition process by the Orissa government for the Posco project in the Dhinkia gram panchayat of Jagatsinghpur district did not make any headway on Saturday following resistance by members of a five-party delegation and villagers. The gram panchayat remained a hostile region for the district administration that had in the past fortnight stepped up the land acquisition process for the steel plant. With children and women at the...

The Communist Party of India (Marxist) has said that the ordinance issued by the Mamata Banerjee-led Trinamool Congress government in West Bengal to reclaim 400 out of 997.11 acres of land at the abandoned small car project site of Tata Motors at Singur was “unconstitutional” as the Assembly was then in session. A special session of Assembly was convened on May 30 to elect the Speaker, and the House was given...

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee faced a major embarrassment on Friday as she was forced to put on hold an ordinance restoring land in Singur to farmers. The state government on Friday instead proposed to table a Bill in the legislative assembly on Tuesday so that the land in Singur-currently the site of an abandoned Tata Motors factory-can eventually be given back to farmers. "The ordinance that was promulgated on...