The Central Empowerment Committee of the Supreme Court on Thursday asked the State Government to probe into the Prafulla Hede mines at Collem, which is allegedly operating on forest land. The CEC today ordered a probe and in a letter to the Chief Secretary asked the State Government to respond in the matter. It has asked the Government to find whether the mine was operating in violation of forest conservation rules. A second letter has been made to the Chief Conservator of Forests to know how Prafulla Hede mine had encroached upon 1,000 sq m of forestland.

More than 600 indigenous people in the Democratic Republic of Congo began mapping their rainforests on April 9 using gps technology. Their effort is to preserve about 2.4 million hectares of

Issues like conservation of nature and the impact of global warming are all set to take the centrestage in Guwahati during the celebration of Rabindra Jayanti, the birth anniversary of Nobel Laureate Rabindra Nath Tagore. For, Vivekananda Kalyan Kendra and Nature's Beckon, a biodiversity conservation NGO have joined hands to spread theme of nature conservations during the celebration on May 8. With Northeast too gearing up to mark the day, the two organizations have urged people to take a pledge on the day and work for the conservation of nature.

The Forest Department will soon finalise the mechanism for making payments to farmers under the carbon credit scheme for raising forests on private and community land as part of the World Bank-funded Mid-Himalayan Watershed Development Project.

Chief Minister Prem Kumar Dhumal has raised the issue of carbon credits with the Union Government and sought Rs.1,000 crore for Himachal Pradesh every year as compensation for preserving the forest cover in the State. The State can earn a revenue of more than Rs.1,600 crore annually if the

Chief Minister P.K.Dhumal warned today that water scarcity and other environment-related problems were bound to get aggravated unless effective steps were taken to reverse the process of global warming and asserted that the Centre must compensate the hill states that were playing a vital role in reducing greenhouse gases by maintaining forest cover.

The Supreme Court today granted approval for Tata Steel's prospecting licence for mining in Bailadila block in Chhattisgarh for its steel plant at Naxal-infested Dantewada district in the state. A special forest Bench headed by Chief Justice K G Balakrishanan while granting approval for prospecting licence to Tata said the company should approach Director General, Forest for clearance.