I n 1996-97, the government of India claims that it spent Rs 333.8 crore on protection and sustainable use of the environment. Our research shows that in 1998-99, the government spent some Rs 474.81 crore. These may be inadequate sums of money, but by themselves they are not small. How well is this money being spent to protect the health of our ecosystems, the country's biodiversity and human beings?

In an attempt to understand the quality of this research, Down To Earth and the Centre for Science and Environment applied the same criteria it applied to find the Green Scientist 2001 to all the nominations received. And then applied the Five Green Leaves methodology developed by cse to assess the environmental performance of Indian companies (see table: Green Leaves Award Weighted Score ). The results were abysmally poor.

l Of the total 60 nominations received, as many as 52 were rejected for consideration for the award because they were not found to be working in areas of priority identified by the jury. These 52 nominees got 305 marks out of a total of 2,600