A meeting of India's top seismologists and earthquake specialists, which discussed issues arising from the Sikkim earthquake, has strongly recommended that northeastern states set up their own state disaster response units instead of being dependent on centralised forces like the National Disaster Response Force. In addition, the national workshop on 'Housing, Resilience and Rehabilitation' on…
As she guided the young children to the bus, Juri Gogoi was apprehensive. Could she handle this boisterous lot for a whole day and hand them safely back to their homes? She started a head count, all 25 in, so far so good….. The bus took off with a jolt, splashing slush from the wobbly,…
An attentive and large audience listened in pin-drop silence to powerful testimony and presentations from a leading Assamese novelist as well as a top scholar of the region at today's North-east launch of the C-NES report on the impact of conflict on women in the region. "We all have suffered, we have faced trauma and…
The temperatures in the premier North Eastern cities of Guwahati and Shillong have increased by several degrees Celsius in the past years while air pollution caused largely by vehicular emissions and dust has harmed the health of a large section of the population, especially young scholl chidlren, daily labourers and traffic policement. A detailed report…
Noted film maker and activist Anant Patwardhan has called for the repeal of the Armed Forcers Special Powers Act and said that the widespread attitude of ‘my country, right or wrong’ needed to change. Mr. Patwardhan, who is well-known for his espousal of human rights and critique of communal forces, was launching the C-NES report…
C-NES Newsletter (For the quarter July – September 2011) Editorial Sikkim Quake is Wake Up call 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…
The former Governor of Nagaland, Mr. Shyamal Datta, launched the Report ‘Bearing Witness’ on the impact of conflict on women in Nagaland and Assam in Kolkata at the Seagull Centre for Arts, describing it as a document that had ‘opened his eyes’ to the nature of the crisis. “The report and the exhibition are a…
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 University of Madras is interested in collaborating with a premier research centre and think tank of the North-eastern Region of India to enable better learning, exchanges and field research of an area which remains largely unfamiliar to many Indians, especially students and teachers, more than six decades after Independence. Dr. G. Thiruvasagam, Vice Chancellor…
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…