The Maha Kumbh in Allahabad has perhaps no parallel in terms of the sheer size of the congregation. In less than two months over 100 million people are expected to come to this city, at the confluence of the Ganga and the Yamuna. But even as they celebrate the rivers it seems they don’t see the rivers, but only the ritual.

This mela is about how the Hindu religion — and I believe all religions — is based on a deep understanding of and respect for nature’s strength. But we now worship without reason. So people can take a dip in the polluted river but still believe that the dirt, the filth and the plastic that swims around them will not defile the river’s properties. Our strength has become our weakness.

In an effort to prove that pollution affects the rich and the powerful as much as the common man and the homeless, a court-appointed body is working to put up an air monitoring device on Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit's house.

The monitor would specifically detect levels of ground-level ozone, which is created when sunlight interacts with emissions from vehicle exhaust, chemical solvents and other sources and turns it into an imminent, floating hazard.

NEW DELHI: Air pollution is the fifth largest killer in India taking 6.2 lakh lives per year and Delhi is among one of the five most critically polluted regions in the country, a study by a US-based health institute has claimed.

The other four most critically polluted regions in the country are Ghaziabad, Gwalior, West Singbhum district in Jharkhand and Raipur, according to the study.

Ahmedabad: The average age of guards in Palamau Tiger sanctuary is 53 and at Simlipal Tiger Sanctuary it is 49 years, but for guards in Gujarat it is 39 years.

Officials said that of 388 staffers, 149 are 20 to 30 years old. The study carried out by deputy conservator of forests Sandeep Kumar revealed that the average age of guards is 39 years, while that of foresters is 42.5 years. The guards and foresters are those actually in the field, responsible for conservation.

How will solar energy be made to work in India? As I discussed in my previous article, there are three key challenges.

An evening to honour India’s changemakers

They took the path less travelled, and on Monday it will lead a group of remarkable men and women to the stage for the second Times of India Social Impact Awards in association with J P Morgan. The awards are being given to changemakers within NGOs, corporates and the government who have quietly worked to transform the lives of millions of marginalized Indians.

Grid-based solar power only reaches only households that are connected to energy supply, and simply subsidises costly solar for an already-reached population

India’s solar power policy is now entering round two. Much needs to be reviewed and reworked, since the business of solar energy has seen massive turbulence in India as well as globally. In the first phase (2010 to 2013) of the Jawaharlal Nehru National Solar Mission (JNNSM), the target was to set up 1,000-2,000 MW of grid-based solar power in the country. By 2013, the country has indeed commissioned some 1,000 MW of solar power, but 700 MW of this target comes from a non-JNNSM state, Gujarat.

Every time people lose faith in the political establishment, urban middle classes embrace fascism and the poor take up arms against the state

The last image of 2012 is that of protesters storming central Delhi, outraged at the brutal rape of a young girl and the culture of violence against women. This outburst by the educated middle class, many of them young women, was spontaneous as much as it was leaderless. But as we move into the next year, we need to think about the government’s response to this protest and other demonstrations. We need to understand if the Indian state has any clue about what is going on under its nose — and feet.

Inclusiveness, especially in education, rang out as a cause close to the hearts of the jury at the awards. And their selection of Pratham USA as the winner in the category of International Contribution to India seemed to confirm this.

Through the three-hour deliberations, issues of inclusiveness kept cropping up with probing questions about the kind of interventions being made, the extent and scope of work being done, and the model's scalability. But when it came to the International Contribution category, the jury lost no time in choosing its favourite.