-The Deccan Herald "Law is misused for business interests." There is reason for serious concern over the aggressive acquisition of farm land by the Karnataka government on behalf of corporates. It has notified 3,382 acres in Halligudi in Gadag district where Korean steel giant Posco proposes to set up a 6 million tonne per annum integrated steel plant and a 450-mw captive power plant. Farmers in the area, whose lands have been...

Nearly half of the people served notice have filed their submissions before the Special Land Acquisition Officer (SLAO) of KIADB at Dharwad. Of the 232 notices served, 144 persons have replied and nearly 97 land owners had outrightly opposed the land acquisition and categorically declared before the land acquisition officer that they would not give their lands. Forty-seven land owners have given ‘conditional consent’ for giving their lands. According to the Assistant...

There will soon be a new set of glass doors at Krishi Bhavan. The newly elevated Cabinet Minister for Rural Development Jairam Ramesh plans to bring the doors — a signature element of his interior décor right from his early days at the Commerce Ministry — to his new office. Over the last two tumultuous years at the Environment Ministry, those doors have symbolised the transparency and accessibility he claims...

The land problem in Singur was a turning point in the political fortunes of both the Left Front and the Trinamul Congress. The story is far from complete, and the legal twists and turns between Mamata Banerjee and the house of Tata could unfold in surprising ways. The issue of adequate compensation for farmers, who had to part with their land, is still an open question to which many well...

In his fields, Badhia Naval Singh , a farmer tilling 8 bighas of land in the Bagli tehsil in Madhya Pradesh, has been seeing something strange for a while now. Earlier, if he pulled out a tuft of grass, he would see earthworms . "Ab woh dikhna bandh ho gaye hain (they don't show up any longer)," says the 45-yearold . Also, he says, when he ploughed earlier, the soil...