The ministries of environment and coal may still be bickering over the classification of ' go' and ' no- go' areas for mining , but an International Labour Organisation ( ILO)- funded report on India's indigenous population claims that more than half the country's mineral wealth is obtained by violating the rights of tribals. 'India and the Rights of Indigenous Peoples', a report prepared by the Asia Indigenous Peoples Pact with...

The Labour and Employment Ministry is expecting Rs 1,300 crore under planned allocation in the coming Budget, which will enable it to reach out to more workers in unorganised sector and extending health insurance cover to poor, an official said. The Ministry was allocated Rs 965 crore under the same plan in the ongoing fiscal. "We are expecting Rs 1,300 crore in the coming Budget to extend insurance cover to the poor...

These days, Jhum cultivation also known as ‘slash and burn method of cultivation’, ‘shifting cultivation’ etc has been under continuous scanner for its productivity and ecological viability. This form of cultivation is followed widely in almost all the North Eastern States including the hill areas of Manipur. There are those who consider jhum cultivation as unproductive and ecologically disastrous so that people (understood as tribal people of the hill areas)...

Even as the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act enters its sixth year, Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar said in Delhi on Thursday that Cash transfers were the answer to the eternal questions about inefficiencies in government schemes. He had tried out direct Cash transfers in his effort to give Bihar’s girls bicycles, he said, and discovered that the programme had a “92 per cent success rate”. No programme, he said,...

Citing various irregularities in the implementation of Food for Work Scheme under Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA), Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar today strongly advocated Cash subsidy as a better option. ''If people are to be helped through Cash, it would avoid diversion of the commodity or any other product meant for them,'' Mr Kumar said in an informal interaction with Members of the Indian Women's Press Corps...