Madhya Pradesh chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan wants it to be the new Singapore. State officials call it Urjanchal, land of energy. For sociologist Sakarama Somayaji, the enduring image from India’s emerging energy wonderland in Singrauli is the women who sell baskets of stones on the roadside. Individually or in groups, the women break stones, and sell them to passing trucks for R80-R90 a basket, a day’s labour. The women are...

A day before the Group of Ministers meeting on environment clearances, the Environment ministry has expressed willingness to increase the coal mining area to 74 % in 28 blocks, which fall in forests, as against 65% earlier. Environment minister Jairam Ramesh is expected to inform the GoM that he was willing to allow coal mining in 28 coal blocks, which fall in 'No-Go' areas by redefining its boundaries. This means that an...

Results of an investigation report filed by senior government of India officials have confirmed largescale anomalies in the implementation of Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MG NREGS) in Sonbhadra district of Uttar Pradesh. The investigation was conducted in the first week of January, in response to a series of complaints filed by Sanjay Dixit, member, Central Employment Guarantee Council, in August, 2010, that pointed to widespread misuse of...

Kerala, Punjab, Tamil Nadu high on HDI: study In a study done by Abusaleh Shariff, chief economist at the National Council for Applied Economic Research (NCAER), Gujarat surprisingly emerges as a State with high levels of hunger, while simultaneously boasting high per capita income and consistent income stability. The hunger levels in Gujarat are higher than in Tamil Nadu and West Bengal, and surprisingly even higher than in Uttar Pradesh, according to...

Agriculture department confirms high pesticide residues THE country’s regulators have failed to check the flow of pesticides into the food chain, suggests a monitoring report of the Department of Agriculture and the Indian Agricultural Research Institute, the country’s premier institute. Fruits, vegetables, poultry and milk are all laced with high pesticide residues —much above the maximum residue limits (MRL) set by the Prevention of Food Adulteration Act of 1954. Samples of...