-The Hindu They also allege borewells are being dug without permission Chennai: Environmentalists and naturalists are shocked at the conversion of traditional agriculture land into resorts and digging of borewells in the ecologically sensitive Sirumalai forests in the Dindigul forest division. Sirumalai is popular for its hill banana, which is grown only there. Basically, it is a catchment area, where sixty per cent of flora found in the Western Ghats, are available. This...

-The Times of India MADURAI: In what may come as a surprise package to the farming community, the number of farmers in Madurai district has increased marginally, even as there is a decline at the national level. In 2001, there were 3.1 lakh land holdings or farmers for a population of 25.78 lakh in the district. But now, the number has gone up to 3.28 lakh against a population of...

-PTI Guwahati: In Assam, where the social status of women is high in comparison to some other states, the female population recorded a growth rate of 19.7 per cent during the last decade compared to 18.2 per cent males against the previous decade's 18.5 per cent and 15.7 per cent. The growth rate of the female population in the state over males continued to be high during 2001-2011 as in the previous...

-The Telegraph Hyderabad: As rights groups accused the anti-Maoist militia Salwa Judum of atrocities on Chhattisgarh's villagers, its founder Mahendra Karma kept insisting his only aim was to "liberate" the tribals from the rebels' tyranny and propaganda. The future of the government-backed vigilante group, which still survives unofficially despite a Supreme Court order to disband it, now looks bleak after the Maoists killed Congress tribal leader Karma yesterday. The Salwa Judum (whose name...

-PTI The Supreme Court has held that a life convict cannot claim to have a right to be released after spending 14 years behind the bars. A bench of P Sathasivam and J S Khehar said that life imprisonment means imprisonment for whole life and only the President and the Governors can remit the sentence and allow the convict to be released. The bench, however, said that in those cases the government should...