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FeaturesAbandoned victims of the Kosi embankments
January 2005 marked 50 years since the foundation stone was laid for the building of embankments on the Kosi river, to help control the flooding. It also marked 50 years of neglect of the 'embankment victims' who are forced to live trapped within the structures that were supposed to transform their lives More... Daily disastersPost-tsunami, organisations are vying to adopt this village or set up that school. But tsunami or no tsunami, the urban fisherfolk and coastal poor live in miserable conditions. Why does it take a sudden disaster to mobilise us? What about the daily disaster of living experienced by India's poor and pollution-impacted communities? More... Four-thousand-rupee reliefThe survivors of a natural disaster often find that relief is the second disaster to hit them. In this special report from Pattincherry near Nagore, Tamil Nadu, it is clear that the relief is going to the strongest, to those who already have enough More... Tsunami destroys villages but fails to break down caste wallsActivists from the National Campaign on Dalit Human Rights, Safai Karmachari Andolan and Sakshi Human Rights Watch, who toured tsunami-hit dalit villages in Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh brought back accounts of serious discrimination in aid distribution and rehabilitation More... Wayanad: Arrack as distress tradeToddy is legal in Kerala, while arrack is banned. Also, while a litre of toddy costs Rs. 30, a sachet of arrack goes for Rs 11. As the farm crisis sees thousands of migrants crossing over into Karnataka, arrack shops right on the border are doing brisk business More... The tsunami as a man-made disasterMangrove swamps are nature's way of protecting coastal areas from large waves and cyclones. But intensive shrimp farming and unbridled tourism have destroyed mangroves and coral reefs and caused the dilution of coastal regulations. The tsunami must therefore be seen as not just the wrath of nature, but the result of faulty economic practices and the destruction of ecosystems More... After the tsunami: A frenzy of giving and grabbingThere's more money, clothes and goodwill than there is vision, organisation and an understanding of what's needed, reports Nityanand Jayaraman from Cuddalore, Tamil Nadu. It seems as if the need to help has overcome the need for help, as relief agencies rush to be photographed giving aid to the 'victims' More... Fewer jobs, more buses in WayanadIt's no longer just landless labourers on the bus to Kutta. Many masons and carpenters are also crossing the border into Karnataka in search of work, spurred on by the collapse of employment in Wayanad. P Sainath continues his series on the agrarian crisis in Wayanad More... Crisis drives the bus to KuttaPrior to 1995, the Kerala State Road Transport Corporation did not ply a single bus between Manathavady in Wayanad and Kutta in Kodagu, Karnataka. Today, there are 24 trips daily on this route, as people leave the area in droves in search of work More... Hope dies slowly in WayanadMany plantations in Wayanad have shut down, leaving thousands out of work. The once-numerous Tamil migrant labourers are far fewer today, and out-migration of local labour is the new trend. The real-life agrarian crisis is very dramatic, leaving few takers for reel stories on the big screens in the region More... So near to God, so far from HeavenChurch income has fallen sharply as the laity have gone into debt in Wayanad. But the larger reality is also more complex. While the church does reflect the pain of its farmer base, it is also, in some cases, a source of at least a few of the dues that worry them More... Wayanad: the cross and the crisisThe declining fortunes and health of the religious establishment in Kerala's Wayanad region mirrors what is happening to the parishioners themselves More... Where have Chelakkodan Aysha and Rabiya gone?Even as India witnessed a 14% decadal growth rate in literacy over the last decade, Kerala, the state that led the country's literacy movement, lost ground. The two women who became the icons of Kerala's successful total literacy campaign in the 1980s are probably back in their kitchens now, unable to read or write More... Andhra farmers lose crores in insuranceSince 1991, farmers hit by the agrarian crisis in Andhra Pradesh have lost hundreds of crores of rupees in lapsed insurance policies. In Anantapur district alone, tens of thousands of farmers and agricultural workers facing bankruptcy could no longer pay the premiums on their policies More... The after-death industryFor many in Andhra Pradesh's agrarian crisis, even death is not the end of the trouble. Instead, it is the beginning of a new burden for the families of the survivors More... How the better half dies — IIThe world 'suicide widows' face is a daunting one -- to run the farm, face the creditors, bring up the children and earn a living is not easy. Nor is having to pay off debts they did not themselves incur. Yet, some of them try More... How the better half dies — IAs farming floundered, many families from Anantpur came to the towns in search of work As the men sought work as auto drivers or daily wage labour, often unsuccessfully, the stress on their wives was enormous. The collapse of farming is closely linked to the suicides of hundreds of women in the district More... Job drought preceded farm crisisLong before the drought bit deep, Andhra Pradesh's Anantapur district was already in trouble. The close links between workers, farming and industry were broken by the new policies of the 1990s More... Seeds of suicide - I IPart two of an article on the new moneylenders in Andhra Pradesh -- the seeds, fertiliser and pesticide dealers, who are at the centre of a growing controversy. This concludes P Sainath's series on farmer suicides in the state More... Seeds of suicide - IThe seed, pesticide and fertiliser dealers are the new moneylenders of the Andhra Pradesh countryside. The power this group wields is a vital factor in the ongoing crisis of the suicides of farmers. The first of a two-part article by P SainathMore... Dreaming of water, drowning in debtIn Andhra Pradesh's Anantapur district, which has seen four successive crop failures, superstition, the occult, God, government and technology have all been pressed into service in a desperate search for water, writes P SainathMore... Chandrababu: Image and realityOn most indicators, Chandrababu Naidu ran the worst performing state in the south of India for nearly 10 years. Yet the more damage he did, the more his media standing grew, says P SainathMore... Little panchayat, percentage rajIn Andhra Pradesh, the Naidu government's Janmabhoomi model of development gutted the panchayats and curbed local democracy. Hence, the panchayats have proved totally ineffective during the agrarian crisis, reports P SainathMore... Micro-credit, maxi riskLandless agricultural workers, who attempt to earn money on their meagre savings by acting as small-time moneylenders, are also casualties of the debt-driven farmers' suicides in Andhra Pradesh More... |
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