Orissa is going through a "steel revolution". In the past three years, the state government has signed more than 40 MoUs with companies, both domestic and foreign, signing off 20 billion tonnes of iron ore that it is supposed to be sitting on. But it has also meant destruction of the natural habitats of people, flora and fauna.

The iniquitous development agenda pursued by successive governments at the centre and the state has rendered several tribal groups in Orissa, who reside in some of the poorer, more inaccessible districts of the state, largely marginal to the governance process.

This article describes the essential characteristics of various people's movements in Orissa against the backdrop of the recent Kalinga Nagar killings and also analyses how society reacts to such movements.

The World Bank has been promoting the public-private partnership model based on management contracts in developing countries. In such contracts, all the risks are borne by the government while the companies do not invest a penny.

This article looks at the emerging policy context on irrigation and drinking water supply in Jharkhand, the position of water rights in state legislation, the importance of water user groups, the critical issues of access to water for both the rural and the urban poor and the legal implications.
 

Mumbai’s Slum Sanitation Programme that seeks community responsibility and its involvement in the setting up of sanitation facilities in living areas holds out important lessons for similar collaborative endeavours between the government, funding agencies, civil society organisations and the affected community.

This article is based on the findings of a recent survey of the midday meal programme in Madhya Pradesh. Comparison of the new ‘suruchi bhojan’ with the old ‘daliya’ programme in the government primary schools in the survey area and observations on programme implementation in Karnataka, suggest a pressing need to overhaul the administrative and financial organisation of the scheme in order to increase its effectiveness.

The outward expansion of larger metros, gradual changes in land use and occupations have transformed the rural hinterland into semi-urban or ‘peri-urban’ areas.

Twenty years on, the verdict on how the Indian state has responded to Bhopal should be unequivocal: not only did it neglect its responsibilities, it actively suppressed the rights of the victims.

This paper builds an analytical and practical framework for using resources more effectively by making services work for poor people.

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