I read Aman Sethi's piece on the Saranda Development Plan (“Nine months on, police camps sole development in Saranda plan”, June 4) with great interest but with greater anguish. Before I deal with his main charge — that private mining interests are behind the SDP — I want to lay out what the SDP is all about. It is the first systematic experiment in combining a security-oriented and development-focussed approach...

Chandil, Jharkhand: Outrage has given way to expectancy in West Singhbhum, Jharkhand, where people are now waiting for the benefits that will come to them from a multipurpose project on the Subarnarekha, a venture that is finally set to take off after 40 years of holdups and protests.   On June 15, a team of engineers will test the dam’s vital functions and, if all goes well, the inauguration is expected in...

Yet-to-be-made public report dismisses environmental concerns The high-level committee set up by the Union Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF) to study the socio-economic and ecological impacts of the proposed bauxite mining in Andhra Pradesh’s Visakhapatnam district has submitted its final report  favouring mining. The committee concludes mining will not have any significant negative impact on the ecology. At the same time it recommends settling all claims under the Forest Rights...

Scheme meant for the tribals has been hijacked by mining firms, claim activists The construction of 24 fortified police bases in the midst of Saranda, an 800-sq. km. patch of forested hills veined with a quarter of India's iron ore reserves, has sparked concerns among political activists who believe that a development plan intended for tribals in Jharkhand has been hijacked by mining corporations. In October last year, Union Minister for Rural...

-The Times of India Between 60 and 65 million people are estimated to have been displaced in India since Independence, the highest number of people uprooted for development projects in the world.  "This amounts to around one million displaced every year since Independence," says a report released recently by the Working Group on Human Rights in India and the UN (WGHR). "Of these displaced, over 40% are tribals and another 40% consist...