-The Hindu Geeta Devi’s neat Hindi signature is written below her photograph &NDAsh; a shy-looking woman with a dupatta covering her head &NDAsh; in an affidavit duly notarised in Haridwar last month. Dehradun district resident Manju smiles out of the photograph on her affidavit, where she states she is just 36 years old. According to the government of Uttarakhand, both Manju and Geeta Devi are dead. After all, both women are manual...
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The great Africa land grab-Phil Bloomer
-Farmlandgrab.org Oxfam’s Phil Bloomer reports on the shocking scaNDAl of (mostly) secretive land-grabbing, usually from those least able to defend their rights Land grabbing has fast become a major threat to poor communities in Africa, Asia and South America. Poverty-stricken women and men are being driven from their homes and the land they rely on to grow food to eat and make a living, usually without compensation. In many cases this is...
More »Keeping the nation in the dark -V Venkatesan
-The Hindu By not publicly disclosing the reasons for rejecting Ajmal Kasab’s mercy petition, Pranab Mukherjee missed an excellent opportunity to contribute to the rule of law President Pranab Mukherjee’s decision to reject the mercy petition submitted by the lone convict in the 26/11 Mumbai terror attack, Mohammed Ajmal Amir Kasab, is an instance of how public perceptions about a convict’s guilt can camouflage the government’s duty to explain the decision. The...
More »New UN report finds rate of new HIV infections has fallen by half in 25 countries
-The United Nations A reduction of more than 50 per cent in the rate of new HIV infections has been achieved across 25 low- and middle-income countries &NDAsh; more than half in Africa, the region most affected by HIV &NDAsh; according to a new United Nations report, which shows that unprecedented acceleration in the AIDS response is producing results. “The pace of progress is quickening &NDAsh; what used to take a decade...
More »Greenhouse gas concentration reached record high in 2011, says UN report
-The United Nations The amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere reached a new record high in 2011, according to a new United Nations report released today, ahead of the start next week of the latest round of global climate changes talks. The UN World Meteorological Organization (WMO), which produced the 2011 Greenhouse Gas Bulletin, said that between 1990 and 2011, there was a 30 per cent increase in radiative forcing &NDAsh;...
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