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Volunteers taking readings to map the shoreline

ALTERNATIVES

A tide turns: Coastal community resilience in the age of climate change

21st March 2018

From ICSF: In the face of climate change and disastrous development projects like Sagarmala, stewardship of coastal land is the primary challenge for coastal communities. Sea level rise and increasing climate unpredictability require local communities to play an active role in creating knowledge-bases for appropriate action, to reduce disaster risk and recreate a healthy coastline….

Conserve/Resist

A timeline of the historic Plachimada agitation, from Keraleeyam Magazine

7th March 2018

When in July 2017, Coca-Cola informed India’s Supreme Court that it won’t restart its bottling plant in Plachimada, Kerala, it brought to a close a decade-long agitation spearheaded by the local community comprising mostly dalits and adivasis. This historic struggle has now been comprehensively documented in a digital project by Neethu Das of Keraleeyam Magazine….

Bookshelf

Constructing hope: ‘Green Earth’ by Kim Stanley Robinson

1st March 2018

Adrian Ayres Fisher writes: Part of the relatively new ‘cli fi’ genre, Kim Stanley Robinson‘s novel ‘Green Earth’, is full of climate change related, extreme weather disasters. It could have been yet another nightmarish fantasy trip. Instead, with underpinnings of Shakespearean comedy, its tone and structure convey hopefulness and there are moments of true joy….

ECOCIDE/EXTINCTION

Uttarakhand’s Kosi river is dying; only an immediate intervention will save it

27th February 2018

From Catch News: Uttarakhand’s Kosi river is dying, which could spell doom for the region. Data from the last 25 years shows that the lean flow capacity of the river during summers has witnessed a massive, over 700%, drop, while the river’s total length has reduced from 225 kilometers to just 41 in 40 years….

Development/Growth

A zero sum game: The rail projects that spell doom for the Cauvery

21st February 2018

The fracas over water sharing has obscured the fact that the Cauvery itself is facing a major threat: two railway lines to be constructed through Kodagu, the forested hill district where the river originates. A river’s fate – and those of the millions that depend on it – now hangs in balance, writes Chirag Chinnappa….

ALTERNATIVES

What urban waste has to do with global warming

20th February 2018

From The Indian Express: Greenhouse gas emissions from solid waste disposal by India increased at the rate of 3.1% per annum between 2000 and 2010, and by China at 4.6% per cent between 2005 and 2012. In both cases it is likely that the figures are underestimated, since they don’t consider emissions from waste transportation….

Conserve/Resist

Cape Town is running out of water. Guess who’s next?

16th February 2018

From BBC: Cape Town is in the unenviable situation of being the first major city in the modern era to face the threat of running out of drinking water. But Cape Town is just the tip of the iceberg. Here are the 11 other cities worldwide that are most likely to run out of water….

ALTERNATIVES

Bookshelf: Alternative Futures: India Unshackled

13th February 2018

A remarkable, first-ever collection of essays on India’s future, by a diverse set of authors – activists, researchers, media practitioners – those who have influenced policies and those working at the grassroots. It presents scenarios of an India that is politically and socially egalitarian, radically democratic, ecologically sustainable and economically equitable, and socio-culturally diverse and harmonious….

Conflict/Dispossession

The ‘Gujarat Development Model’ rests on the twin pillars of authoritarianism and divisive politics

11th February 2018

Atul Sood writes: Why are we not talking about the facts on the ground amidst the cacophonic discourse of the success of the Gujarat model? The need to impose Section 144 every time the Vibrant Gujarat Submit is organized symbolizes one pillar of ‘managing’ support for the model. The cultural narrative is the other pillar….

ALTERNATIVES

Project Puchki: Raising awareness on sustainable living and menstrual hygiene

7th February 2018

Minhaj Ameen writes: Project Puchki has impacted 70,000 students in 1600 schools across 6 Indian States through 80 interns. It is our to take Project Puchki to all rural households of India and create awareness amongst millions of students who are currently outside the gambit of fundamental education on environmental sustainability, sanitation and menstrual hygiene….

ALTERNATIVES

Petition: Safeguard our minerals, our children’s inheritance, from theft

5th February 2018

From Change.org: India’s National Mineral Policy is open till Feb 9, 2018 for public comments. Minerals are a shared inheritance. The present mining system in India is leading to enormous losses of our mineral wealth, with only a few cronies benefiting. This must stop. Hence we are sending the representation to the Ministry of Mines….

Saravanakumar/Icon Films Ltd.

Conserve/Resist

A tribute to Romulus Whitaker, the ‘Snake man of India’

30th January 2018

A tribute to Romulus Whitaker, recently awarded the Padma Shri, among India’s highest civilian honours. Here, the acclaimed herpetologist talks about his decades of work with reptiles which led to setting up of six pioneering institutions including the famous Madras Crocodile Bank, apart from giving snakes and reptiles a positive place in the Indian public’s mind….

ALTERNATIVES

Yogendra Yadav: What is to be done?

26th January 2018

“The idea of India faces an unprecedented challenge. Preventing irreversible damage to the Republic of India, as we have known it, is the most pressing political task of our times, our yugadharma.” So begins Yogendra Yadav’s penetrating analysis of India under the Narendra Modi regime. Essential reading on the 69th anniversary of the Republic’s founding….

Development/Growth

British Raj to Billionaire Raj: India’s inequality is now worse than in 1922

India’s income inequality in 2017 may be worse than what it was during the British Raj. According to a new paper titled ‘Indian income inequality, 1922-2014: From British Raj to Billionaire Raj?’ penned by renowned economists Thomas Piketty and Lucas Chancel, India witnessed a sharp rise in the incomes of top 1 per cent post 1980s….

Conserve/Resist

Tami Nadu’s green warriors: Six environmentalists you should know about

23rd January 2018

From The News Minute: These six environmental activists, not all of them well known, have been at the forefront of the fight against encroachment, destruction and contamination of the natural environment across Tamil Nadu. Also included is the video of a talk by one of the activists featured, Nityanand Jayaraman, on ‘A world without corporations.’…

Conserve/Resist

Will India lose one of its last patches of Jurassic forest?

21st January 2018

From Down to Earth: Kathalekan, in Uttara Kannada district of Karnataka, is a relic forest with Myristica swamp ecosystem. It has remained unchanged for over 100 million years. It’s spread across an area of 25 square kilometres. Today this ancient forest is under severe threat from human interventions in the region, including a proposed highway….

Appuppen/Braindedindia

Conserve/Resist

Shriya Mohan: The Aadhaar of all things

19th January 2018

From The Hindu: From a severely critical stand against Aadhaar in 2014, the Modi-led BJP in power has made a sharp U-turn to bulldoze its way into having every Indian scanned, tagged and labelled. As the Supreme Court begins hearing of petitions that challenge Aadhaar, a timeline of the country’s chequered date with the project….

Development/Growth

Why should India risk an economic disaster to save the American Dream?

17th January 2018

Shelley Kasli writes: Recent changes in India’s foreign direct investment policy allows 100 percent FDI (from current 49%) for single brand retail trading and construction, among others, paving the way for global players. In reality, India is being drawn into the spiral of debt economics to protect the American Dream from turning into a Nightmare….

ALTERNATIVES

Jean Dreze: Jholawala Economics for Everyone

13th January 2018

‘Jholawala’ is a derogatory term that India’s urban elites use to dismiss the arguments of social activists without having to contend with them. Jean Drèze is a prime example of a jholawala who is also a first-rate economist whose arguments cannot be dismissed easily. A condensed version of the thought-provoking introduction to his new book….

ALTERNATIVES

Dr. Amory Lovins on India’s ‘sustainable energy future’

11th January 2018

Amory Lovins, Chief Scientist of the Rocky Mountain Institute, is one of the world’s leading energy experts and a key figure behind China’s ongoing transition to renewable energy. His appointment as a strategic advisor to NITI Aayog suggests that India’s top development policy agency maybe finally be rethinking the country’s present fossil fuel-based energy path….