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Due to a quirk of law, the money earned from cutting trees is being used to fund the country’s ambitious afforestation
programme. Madhu Sarin on how Indian forests and their inhabitants are paying a heavy price for this contradiction
With
global warming and climate change virtually knocking at our door
there is a pressing need to increase the green cover by
conserving the existing forests and by creating new ones. Lots
of efforts are being made to achieve this goal, but are we
really doing a good job? |
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“Only
people can save forests”
There should be an
effective check on the indiscriminate felling of trees,
well-known environmentalist Sunderlal Bahuguna tells Tribune
correspondent SMA Kazmi
Sunderlal
Bahuguna, who was awarded the Padma Vibhushan this year, is one
of the senior-most activists in the country who has devoted his
life to the protection of forests, propagating conservation
efforts and fighting against any attempt to denude the Himalayas
of their forest cover. |
Plant
deodars, save Shimla
Shimla owes its beauty to the
deodar trees planted 140 years ago. The pace of development
has reduced the forest cover and resulted in changes in the soil strata
and water regime. We need to plant deodar trees on a large scale to
preserve the pristine glory of the queen of hills, writes Harsh
Mitter
WE
have come of age. We try to develop and strive for a better living. In
the rat race, our ethical values and strengths are lost as
unimportant, not conforming to our objective of making a quick buck.
Hence, we are no further concerned about the environment we are living
in.
In
Santa land
A winter trip to Lapland in
northern Finland provides an opportunity for snowmobiling and riding a
reindeer-sledge, not to mention the chance of visiting the home of
Santa Claus, writes Ranjita Biswas
MILES
and miles of dazzling snow all around in winter; a sky that comes
alive with the mysterious and beautiful flickering Northern Lights,
Lapland, in the far north of Finland, is a fairytale landscape full of
magic for kids and adults alike.
A
language called music
Nomadic communities all over
the world are distinct from each other. The only thing that binds them
together is music, writes Ashwaq Masoodi
THEY
are gypsies from different countries, states and cultures, yet there
is a universal language that binds them...a language of music. With
the aim of promoting nomadic values and culture, NOW - ‘Nomadic
Orchestra of World’, conceived and directed by Meenakshi and Vinay
Rai is all set to reverberate in Europe now.
Brave
new cinema
Pushed by a breed of
politically and socially aware filmmakers, mainstream Hindi cinema is
discovering a radical core, writes Saibal
Chatterjee
Screenwriter-director
Anurag Kashyap has mellowed down with time but has lost none of
the inner frisson that triggered films like Paanch, Black Friday
and No Smoking.
Lata
the legend
Nasreen Munnni Kabir’s
conversational biography Lata Mangeshkar — In Her Own Voice,
takes readers into the world of most gifted singer of Hindi film
music, writes M. L. Dhawan
FOR
all the fame Lata Mangeshkar has achieved, there is little known about
her. Nasreen Munnni Kabir extends her earlier work on television on
the songstress with a book Lata Mangeshkar—In Her Own Voice.
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