Joynal Abedin was a hunter and poacher. But two accidents changed his life: an unborn buffalo calf’s untimely death and a forest officer’s squashing by a rogue elephant. He has now dedicated his life to wildlife conservation in Assam’s Dibru Saikhowa forest. The gun has hypnotic powers. I realised this very early in life. I…
The earthquake in Sikkim and the sheer terror and sense of helplessness that it inspired among the victims as well as those who have been trying to rescue them and document/report on event is a grim reminder of the power that nature can unleash without warning. I’m not talking about the ‘havoc’ that our natural…
The report of the Task Force on development processes for Himalayan Hill States set up by the Planning Commission, Government of India, and which was handed over to the Planning Commission in December 2010 talks of the importance of the Boat Clinics initiative (see below). The premier agency mandated to conduct the study was the…
Madras University's Political Science Department under Prof. Ramu Mannivannan, head of department, is hosting a three-day outreach programme on campus beginning on Sept 22 with the release of the Report 'Bearing Witness: The Impact of Conflict on Women in Nagaland and Assam'; this will be followed by the opening of the photo exhibition; a screening…
Swaminathan S Aiyar writes in his hugely popular column Swaminomics in The Times of India about the ‘Ships of Hope on the Mighty Brahmaputra’.
The Northeast is poised for a leap forward, as is the rest of the country. This may sound paradoxical at a time when there are so many prophets of gloom and doom. As one who has been reporting on India since the birth of the new Republic, I have heard such apocalyptic forecasts time and…
Twenty-two year old Manjula reached the radio station before daybreak one day in August last year and started broadcasting Tsunami alerts at 5:00 a.m. Early morning listeners were caught unaware as they are used to the community radio station, Kalanjiam Vaanoli, beginning its broadcast only at eight. By mid-morning, Nagapattinam in Tamil Nadu and the surrounding…
On July 7, 2011, the Registrar-General of India (who is also the Census Commissioner) – and which office, for some unfathomable reason, best known perhaps to some babu in the GOI, remains located in the Ministry of Home Affairs, instead of the Ministry of Family Welfare – released the figures for MMR, IMR and TFR…
Dr. Manmohan Singh’s declaration that a quarter of Bangladesh’s population were anti-India and radicalized by Islam so embarrassed the Centre which had put it blithely on its website on the basis, one surmises, of “transparency” and then swiftly withdrew the statement (without anyone explaining officially why). “… we must reckon that at least 25 percent…
The role of media in influencing readers and viewers has been rarely under as much stress as these days following the closure of The News of the World, Britain largest selling newspaper, after its editors and reporters were involved in a phone and email hacking scam where they bribed police, misused a murdered girl's cell…