Varanasi, which is known as Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Lok Sabha constituency during 2014, has hit the headlines recently due to people's struggle for water rights. Altogether 18 village councils (Gram Panchayats) of Varanasi have written recently to Uttar Pradesh Pollution Control Board to stop overexploitation of groundwater by the Coca-Cola bottling plant, which is situated in Mehdiganj (please click here to access their letters).   The village councils, which have...

-NDTV In a few days, on the 29th of November, a group of four safai karmacharis (sweepers) and three beldars (diggers) along with three more senior persons, all working for the New Delhi Municipal Council (NDMC), will be returning from a week-long official trip to Japan and South Korea where they are learning first-hand about sanitation, cleanliness, waste disposal as well as the maintenance of urban colonies, markets etc. The NDMC...

-The Hindu The production of waste in India is growing at an exponential rate. However, the welfare and dignity of the informal workers involved in the stigmatised sector of waste management remains at the bottom of any government’s political agenda. Human society has always produced waste and always will. Waste materials — substances without value — are constantly generated in all production, all distribution and all consumption processes. The time waste spends...

-The Times of India NEW DELHI: "Our lungs have not yet fully developed and we cannot take further pollution through bursting of crackers," said three infants in their petition before the Supreme Court seeking a ban on crackers this Dussehra and Diwali besides a host of measures like implementation of Bharat V norms for vehicles to arrest the capital's worsening air quality. In a first of its kind petition in judicial history,...

-The Times of India MORADABAD: The western UP district of Moradabad has for some time now been getting 50% of all printed circuit boards in India. No wonder then that it generates a staggering 9 tonnes of hazardous waste daily, with officials saying close to 50,000 people are involved in it. Most of the recycling is illegal and residents have now begun to panic. Confirming their worst fears, latest research by...