Meena Menon MUMBAI: Farmers' agitation against shortage of fertilizers in Maharashtra resulted in traffic blockade on the Nagpur-Hyderabad highway on Saturday morning. The angry farmers, led by the Shiv Sena's Ramtek MP Prakash Jadhav, agitated for over an hour and burnt tyres. The State is admittedly facing a 60 per cent shortage of fertilizers and farmers in Vidharbha and Marathwada have been protesting for a while.

Waste plastic products should not be treated as threats to our environment. A proper system to recycle these products and efforts at extracting fuel from them may turn these waste products into invaluable assets, said Amarjyoti Kashyap president of the non-Government organisation (NGO) Environ. This is very significant in these days of growing threats of scarcity and rising price of fossil fuel. Besides, there is also the angle of environment pollution, which can be tackled better with the use of plastic fuel and application of a safe technology to extract fuel from plastic.

India's own Bt cotton is set for commercial release.

The crucial change required in cases of compulsory land acquisition is to pay the farmer the replacement cost of the asset being acquired at the time he receives the compensation, says Prabhu Ghate

In a grubby courtroom in Manmad, a major train junction around 90 km from Nashik, a pitched battle is being fought to protect the rights of an elephant. Lakshmi has been in custody since April 14 after the Manmad police registered a complaint against the owner, alleging that he had "whipped and poked' the elephant, troubling and abusing it during a BSP rally to mark Ambedkar Jayanti.

Even as nearly 4,000 people in the city are detected with tuberculosis every year, the numbers of those also resistant to drugs has increased over the years.

The contentious issue of land acquisition for industry cannot be resolved justly without a "precautionary principle' approach that respects livelihood rights. GOING by the number and intensity of protests against displacement under way in numerous States, land acquisition for industrial, mining and infrastructure projects has become India's single most contentious issue. Land is now the main site of struggle as popular movements confront predatory capital, which can only accumulate through dispossession. At stake are thousands of square kilometres of land on which at least a few million livelihoods depend. For instance, the Special Economic Zones (SEZs) which have received formal or "in-principle' approval will alone need over 2,000 square kilometre. If the even larger swathes typically involved in mining leases, plots earmarked for industry, and areas claimed by highway development, and above all, by suburban housing

Plastic garbage is playing havoc with mother earth. From villages to cities plastics are being used in such a way that the whole country seems to be a heap of plastic garbage. A Nagpur based company has taken initiative to use plastic garbage in producing petro products. Dr Jhadgaonkar related to this company, gave information to municipal corporation and MP Pollution Control Board officials about the scheme of converting plastic garbage into petro products. Earlier, this scheme went to bite dust due to the negligence of officials. Now, the work of implementing this scheme has started.

Big, bigger Almost a third of the entire Nagpur district, that is 3,780 sq km, will be brought under the metropolitan region. Of this 1,520 sq km will be taken up under the first phase