• 01 February, 2012

The inconvenient truth

Many years ago, in a desperately poor village in Rajasthan, people decided to plant trees on the land adjoining their pond so that its catchment would be protected. But this land belonged to the revenue department and people were fined for trespass. The issue hit national headlines. The stink made the local administration uncomfortable. They then came up with a brilliant game plan—they allotted the land to a group of equally poor people. In this way the poor ended up fighting the poor. The local government got away with the deliberate murder of a water body.

• 13 December, 2011

Indian environment minister Jayanthi Natarajan gives hard hitting speech, receives standing ovation

• 08 December, 2011

Red flag to green fund

Durban, December 1: Arguments and stalemates are a passé at UN climate change conferences. UN’s 17th Conference of Parties on Climate Change (COP17), being hosted at Durban, South Africa saw its first impasse after three days of the negotiations, when a group of countries from disparate economic standing stopped the adoption of a report that could help set up the $100 billion a year fund to combat the effects of global warming in developing countries.

• 08 December, 2011

The Verbal Battle of Durban

Durban, December 6: The verbal battle of Durban was fought in a plenary at the Nkosi Albert Luthuli Convention Centre. It was fought on December 5, 2011, 10:00 am to 11:30 am. Here is a no-holds barred version of the battle. We apologise for this rather lengthy posting. It was, after all, a verbal battle. If you only want to know how India weighed in, rhetorical mace and all, scroll to the last bit. Thanks for your patience. Here goes: