Physiography

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Don't cut my oak trees: A film on afforestation in Uttarakhand by the Himalaya Seva Sangh
"Don't cut my oak trees, they give me water"."We get cool air from them, we get cool water".
"Don't cut my oak trees, they give me water".

So goes the plaintive title song of this short movie. Produced by the Himalaya Seva Sangh, the film on afforestation relies heavily on interviews with Dr.Shekhar Pathak of PAHAR and self-help group members from Mukteshwar, Sunadi, and Indwal.
Posted on 30 Dec, 2012 07:40 PM

The status and distribution of freshwater biodiversity in the Western Ghats, India- A report by International Union for Conservation of Nature
This report presents the outcomes of the Western Ghats Freshwater Biodiversity Assessment project Posted on 26 Sep, 2012 10:27 AM

This report by International Union for Conservation of Nature presents the outcomes of the Western Ghats Freshwater Biodiversity Assessment project, which was developed with the intention of compiling and making freely available information on the conservation status and distribution of key group

Whose river is it anyway - Political economy of hydropower in the Eastern Himalayas - A paper published in the Economic and Political Weekly
This paper highlights the various debates that have emerged in India the context of the highly controversial issue of large dams being built on the rivers of the eastern Himalayas Posted on 25 Jul, 2012 05:38 PM

This paper published in the Economic and Political Weekly, highlights the various debates that have emerged in India the context of the highly controversial issue of large dams being built on the rivers of the eastern Himalayas, the recent campaigns by the people from the Nor

"Taral Darpane Samajer Mukh" by Joya Mitra – Bengali translation of Anupam Mishra's booklet "Tairne Wala Samaj Doob Raha Hai" on floods in Bihar
This is the Bengali translation of Anupam Mishra’s book “Tairne wala samaj doob raha hai” written in the context of the floods in the Kosi river in Bihar in 2004. Posted on 21 Jul, 2012 04:19 PM

cover page

 The second edition of the book came out in 2008 just after the devastating Bihar floods in the year when the river thundered down from the Himalayas on its way to the sea sweeping half of Bihar.

The state and fate of Himalayan glaciers - A paper published in the magazine Science
This paper published in the magazine Science highlights the importance of the Himalayan glaciers, the current uncertainties in relation to the status of glaciers, their implications for water resources in the region and the prevailing public and scientific debate around them. Current evidence indicates that most Himalayan glaciers are losing mass at rates similar to glaciers elsewhere, except for emerging indications of stability or mass gain in the Karakoram. Posted on 05 May, 2012 06:21 PM

The paper argues that there is a poor understanding of the processes affecting the Himalayan glaciers in the context of the diversity of climatic conditions and the extremes of topographical relief within the region, making projections speculative, which can have a significant impact on the future of water resources in the area. It is thus important to have more information on the status of the glaciers in the Himalayan region.

Effects of industrial and agricultural activities on properties of groundwater - A paper published in the Bulletin of Environment, Pharmacology & Life Sciences
This paper published in the journal Bulletin of Environment, Pharmacology & Life Sciences describes the findings of a study that was carried out to check the effects of industrial and agricultural activities on the groundwater properties in terms of heavy metal concentration. Polluted groundwater is defined as groundwater that has higher concentrations of dissolved or suspended elements than the maximum permissible concentrations fixed by national or international standards for drinking, industrial or agricultural purposes. Sometimes natural groundwater pollution may also occur because of the presence of the respective substances above the prescribed limits. Posted on 05 May, 2012 03:24 PM

The main sources of groundwater contamination are industrial, municipal and agricultural wastes (both solid and liquid), rocks, sludge and slimes, refuse, pesticides, herbicides, effluents from livestock and poultry farms. Many pollutants are even able to penetrate into groundwater aquifers.

Viability of Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) projects in India: Study of Chanju CDM project in Chamba district,Himachal Pradesh
The Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) is introduced by US government as flexibility mechanisms under Kyoto Protocol and allows developed countries to meet their emission reduction commitments by promoting clean development in developing countries. As a policy mandate, it aims to design project-based mechanisms to reduce emissions. These reductions are produced and then subtracted against a hypothetical baseline of emissions which are predicted to occur in the absence of a particular CDM project. India as a signatory of this protocol have been registered 2313 projects up to August 2010, out of these, 64 projects are of hydro power generation and Chanju power project of 36 MW is one of the CDM project in India. Dr Mohinder Kumar Slariya in this article showcases the primary data research based view point, which he presented in the "International Scientific Conference" at Hohenheim University, Germany. Posted on 03 May, 2012 06:30 PM

The present paper is an attempt of the researcher to make a comparative analysis between the expected benefits received by the executing agency under CDM and the actual benefits people are expected to receive from Chanju-I Hydro Electric Project.

Microfinance institutions get away with farmer suicide abetment charges: Police close a third of the cases in Andhra Pradesh
In 2010, Andhra Pradesh witnessed a series of suicides. These were not cases of farmers' suicides—a regular occurrence in the state which continues to be in the grip of an agrarian crisis. The victims in these cases happened to be the poorest of the poor; most of them illiterate dalits and adivasis. The first information reports (FIRs) of the police reveal that most of the suicides were due to coercive loan recovery tactics adopted by the mighty microfinance institutions (MFIs), that had given these people a few thousands of rupees as loans. Ironically, 2010 happened to be a year in which the micro finance industry registered a spectacular growth. This article by M Suchitra in Down to Earth deals with the issue. Posted on 27 Apr, 2012 12:43 PM

Article Courtesy : Down to Earth

Author : M Suchitra

Sikkim’s organic farming to feature in Satyamev Jayate, Aamir Khan’s first television project on DD1
Aamir Khan’s first television project Satyamev Jayate will have one full episode on organic farming in Sikkim. Sikkim is on its way to become totally organic and out of the cultivable land of 58,168 hectares, about 8,168 hectares had already been certified as organic by accredited institutions. Posted on 27 Apr, 2012 11:36 AM

Article and Image Courtesy : iSikkim

Exploring the spatial associations between census based socioeconomic conditions and remotely sensed environmental metrics in Assam, North East India – A study by Gary R Watmough
Gary R Watmough’s PhD explored the spatial associations between socioeconomic variables like female literacy and employment in the non-agricultural sector derived from a subset of the 2001 Indian National Census and environmental metrics. The study was based on freely available remotely sensed satellite sensor data - Landsat Enhanced Thematic Mapper Plus (ETM+) in Assam. Posted on 23 Apr, 2012 01:50 PM

Past studies have found associations between land and poverty, however these studies are usually focused on small areas using ground based studies.

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