THE nearly 3,500 residents of Bhatwadi village along the Uttarkashi-Gangotri highway in Uttarakhand saw their world come crashing down around them on the night of August 12/13. A massive landslide that hit the village formed cracks up to five metres wide on the highway and these crept up the hills to over 100 metres.

IT is 6 p.m. A couple of Hindu priests and a few men and women wait at the Manikarnika Ghat on the banks of the Bhagirathi, as the Ganga is known in the pilgrim town of Uttarkashi in Uttarakhand. Their heads are turned anxiously in the direction of the river upstream.

The Bhagirathi is made to run through a tunnel in Uttarkashi, evoking strong protests from environmentalists.

IT is 6 p.m. A couple of Hindu priests and a few men and women wait at the Manikarnika Ghat on the banks of the Bhagirathi, as the Ganga is known in the pilgrim town of Uttarkashi in Uttarakhand. Their heads are turned anxiously in the direction of the river upstream.

Shishir Prashant / New Delhi July 09, 2008, 0:18 IST The Uttarakhand government recently put off two major hydel projects, the 480 Mw Pala Maneri project and the 400 Mw Bhaironghati project, buckling under the man's arguments. Meet GD Agrawal, a Gandhian, who the locals initially thought was Sunder Lal Bahuguna. The environmental engineer is giving his all to preserve the environment. Shishir Prashant profiles this man of convictions who has trained some of the country's top environmentalists.

Retired IIT Kanpur professor G D Agarwal is currently on a hunger strike against the proposed construction of more dams on the Bhagirathi-Ganga. Sunday Times reports on his struggle