Richard Mahapatra

Richard Mahapatra
"Climate change" - Understanding the connections with energy use, and how India's galloping economic growth and insatiable appetite for energy can be balanced with environmental security?
This June 2006 issue of Agenda looks at some of the issues governing climate change and power production. Posted on 18 Jun, 2011 12:52 AM


Agenda magazine June 2006 special issue on the "Climate change"

 

Introduction: Energy versus emissions: The big challenge of the new millennium
By Rakesh Kalshian
To maintain its economic growth rate of 8-10%, India needs all the energy it can get. But the momentum of economic growth overrides crucial environmental concerns.

Hotting up: The science and politics of climate change
By Aditi Sen
The world is hotting up. Climate systems are changing. The 1990s were the hottest decade ever, sea levels rose by 10-20 cm during the 20th century, and atmospheric carbon dioxide levels are 31% higher than in 1750.

Polavaram fraud - The Polavaram dam on the Godavari could displace 400,000 people and submerge nearly 4,000 hectares of forest land - Article from Down To Earth
The Polavaram dam on the Godavari could displace 400,000 people and submerge nearly 4,000 hectares of forestland.
Posted on 06 May, 2011 08:33 PM

 Most of the people threatened to be displaced cannot be relocated until their rights over forestland are recognized under the Forest Rights Act. How did the Andhra Pradesh government meet this immense challenge? It quietly told the Union environment and forests ministry that all claims have been settled.

The ministry gave forest clearance to the project last year. Now over 50 villages have written to the ministry, saying their forest rights have not been settled. Richard Mahapatra visited the villages and found the state had indeed lied.

Following similar complaints, the ministry had scrapped Vedanta’s proposal to mine Niyamgiri hills and withheld forest clearance to the POSCO steel plant in Odisha. Will it apply the same yardstick to Polavaram?

Residents of Teladibbalu did not know they had forest rights. The village is in the dam’s submergence zone and accessible only by boat (Photo: G Srinivas).Residents of Teladibbalu did not know they had forest rights. The village is in the dam’s submergence zone and accessible only by boat. (Photo: G Srinivas).

Channels of change - Down to Earth
Two villages in Uttar Pradesh have reversed the trend of migration by digging six kilometres of channels to bring water to drought-hit farms.
Posted on 03 Mar, 2011 11:06 AM


Half full, Half empty: A WaterAid publication on the drought and drinking water crisis in Bundelkhand
The paper presents a situational analysis of the crisis and challenges of drinking water in Bundelkhand in the overall context of the drought spell in 2007 Posted on 11 Aug, 2009 01:44 PM

This paper on Bundelkhand from their Water and Sanitation Perspective series of WaterAid presents how ecological degradation and faulty policies make drinking water scarce and less accessible.

Right to water and sanitation - A draft paper by WaterAid
The paper reviews the current status of drinking water and sanitation in India and views the issue of water and sanitation as a fundamental human right Posted on 05 Jun, 2009 11:54 AM

"Right to Water and Sanitation", is a briefing paper (draft) written in March 2009, by Indira Khurana and Richard Mahapatra of WaterAid India, based on secondary research.