-The Hindu   Recently, Tamil Nadu had filed an affidavit assuring that the dam was safe hydrologically and protected from earthquakes. The Supreme Court on Tuesday scheduled a hearing on March 9 of the case concerning the safety of the 126-year-old Mullaperiyar Dam. A Bench led by Justice A.M. Khanwilkar adjourned the hearing on a request made by the Centre. Recently, Tamil Nadu had filed an affidavit assuring that the dam was safe hydrologically and...

-Scroll.in The 126-year-old barrage has dangerously outlived its 50 years of life. Perched high up in the Western Ghats, adjacent to Kerala’s famed Periyar wildlife sanctuary, is a 126-year-old dam that has dangerously outlived the 50 years of life intended for it by colonial British engineers. NK Premachandran, a member of parliament from Kerala, describes the 53.6 metre-high Mullaperiyar dam on the Periyar river as “a ticking timebomb waiting to explode, not only...

-CounterCurrents.org The tragedy in Uttarakhand has again highlighted the extreme vulnerability of dam workers who toil often in very hazardous conditions in very remote parts of the country, away from public gaze. In particular the hazards faced by workers are very serious at several dam construction locations in the Himalayan region. While better safety conditions for dam workers are needed everywhere, this need is particularly acute in the Himalayan region. In recent...

Large dams that cause environmental degradation and large-scale displacement, among other things, have been opposed in India by civil society organisations (CSOs), such as Narmada Bachao Andolan (NBA), National Alliance of People's Movement (NAPM) and People's Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL). A recently published study by the United Nations University's Canada-based Institute for Water, Environment and Health along with other partner organisations reveals that tens of thousands of existing large...

-The Hindu The existing labour laws fell short in responding to the changed world of work The recently passed Code on Social Security, the Industrial Relations Code and the Occupational Safety, Health and Working Conditions Code, which along with the Code on Wages, 2019 subsume 29 labour laws into four codes, were passed after widespread consultations, says Union Labour and Employment Minister Santosh Kumar Gangwar * There has been criticism about the manner...