'Development' vultures
"Spring's fragrant gardens wither away where the mediocre rules" -- Rabindranath Tagore
Kerosene slips through greasy palms
Authorities tread on slippery ground trying to resolve the fuel crisis in Mysore
Piloting disaster
The lot of a woman
The fairer sex has not benefitted as much as men from socio-economic progress
Small change
The Union budget 1999-2000 does not give enough impetus to the environment sector
Humans may follow
A brave GNU world
The free software movement needs both bark and byte
The end of art
...as 'they' know it. Documenta 11 diffuses the boundary between politics and aesthetics
Two-leg safari
Babies can tell nice guys
I don’t want my fingerprints taken
Resisting biometric data
Reaction time
Electronic conferences can speed up decision making which lengthy, costly and conventional deliberations cannot
Locking horns with the bull
International agreements like the Basel Convention are not enough to defeat corporate agendas firmly rooted in the stock market
No laughing matter
Activists are increasingly resorting to attention-grabbing techniques to bring development issues into the public domain
Agenda for people's participation
Two new amendments to the Constitution promise greater effectiveness in civic administration and urban planning; but is that enough?
Southern solutions?
Sustainable industry could emerge in the South if it does not repeat the follies committed by Northern nations during their industrialisation process
Dam alert
The construction of the Thoubal multi-purpose dam and the Tapaimukh dam in Manipur has sparked off protests
the key to prosperity
It's time India realises that it is trade and not merely technological innovation that holds...
When the water begins to stink
...Yet another rainforest disappears and a way of life dies as "development" catches up with the Guaranis of Paraguay
Healer extraordinaire
The death of Arun Kumar Sen, the inspiration behind the Students' Health Home, the biggest medical insurance scheme run by students in the country,…
If you want to read a book
...the near universal necessity of being the owner of a book to read it needs immediate and drastic revision
Women in power
Women elected to panchayats in Karnataka and Rajasthan function in two ways: some live up to expectations and other succumb to the pressures
Bed and breakfast available, only for a year
Researchers probing parasitism among birds say the hosts are cleverer than those living at their expense. The great reed warbler, for example, …
The fragmented heritage of Jotiba Phule
Social radical that he was, Phule's memory lives on, despite accusations that he was pro-British and casteist. But most of his followers are …
Ban on exports helps protect Indian bullfrog
The decline of the Indian bullfrog was reported recently in a New Scientist article. But, it may be premature to conclude that the species is doomed.