-The Hindu With the era of cheap, bountiful water having been replaced by increasing supply-and-quality constraints, many international investors are beginning to view water as the new oil There is a popular, tongue-in-cheek saying in America - attributed to the writer Mark Twain, who lived through the early phase of the California Water Wars - that "whiskey is for drinking and water is for fighting over." It highlights the consequences, even if...

-Press Information Bureau (Ministry of Tribal Affairs) Government has disposed of 31, 06,690 claims by the end of Dec-2013 out of 36,54,420 claims filed under Scheduled Tribes and other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act -2006, commonly known as Forest Rights Act (fra). This is 85.01% of the total claims filed under the Act. Out of the claims disposed off, 14,18,078 titles (13,95,647 individual titles and 22,431...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: The next government at the Centre will have far less money to play with, thanks to something Chidambaram has done. He has transferred substantial control over spending on centrally-sponsored schemes such as employment guarantee and Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan to the states. In the coming year, the amount is Rs 3.4 lakh crore. State governments will be pleased. Political observers see it as a move to curry...

-Tehelka In their struggle for forest rights, the Baigas of Madhya Pradesh have adopted a form of protest dating back to the 1930s, says Shirish Khare An idol placed under a banyan tree passes for a temple in Masna village in Mandla district of Madhya Pradesh. Surrounded by dense forests, the village is inhabited by the "primitive" Baiga tribe. "The government has taken over our land and enclosed it with barbed...

-Outlook Lucknow: Union Minister Jairam Ramesh has shot off another letter to Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav seeking early implementation of the Allahabad High Court order on CBI inquiry into misappropriation of funds under the NREGA. While recalling his earlier correspondence to the Chief Minister, in a fresh letter issued yesterday, Ramesh stressed on the necessity for a CBI probe into funds misappropriation in seven districts including Balrampur, Gonda, Mahoba, Sonbhadra,...