Friday 29 April 2011

Killer Pesticide Endosulfan Banned

The Stockholm convention has come out with a global ban on Endosulfan which had caused more than 500 deaths and crippled more than 4,000 people in Kasargod.

“Even the countries which were in favour of Endosulfan at the Stockholm convention went against it once they saw the videos and photos of Endosulfan-inflicted people in Kasargod. Technological and financial aid will be given to the developing nation to find alternatives for Endosulfan,” informed Chief Minister Achuthanandan.

Rehabilitation of the affected people will be considered and the plantation corporation will have to give land to those affected severely by the pesticide. The pesticide lobby’s attempt at bribing the ministers for continuing the use of Endosulfan has failed, he added. Thanal’s Sridhar R reaffirmed that alternatives are there for Endosulfan and that this will be communicated to the Central authorities.

Earlier, at the convention India relaxed its stand and agreed to phase out the pesticide. With the declaration of the ban, many heaved a relief. Endosulfan hit Kasargod area welcomed the ban and rejoiced. It was a fight that was spread over decades and the result brought smiles to the faces of many in the state. It can be seen as a moral victory for V S Achuthanandan just prior to election results.

This ban means that Endosulfan will be listed in Annexe A of the Stockholm Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants. Chemicals listed in the Annex A of the Convention are banned for production and use due to the threat they pose to living beings and the environment. The ban will cover Endosulfan and its related isomers. However, the exemptions sought by India were granted and will be given to all the countries.

Wednesday 27 April 2011

Convention meeting over endosulfan ( http://www.thehindu.com )

Endosulfan, which caused more than 500 deaths and maimed more than 4000 persons in Kerala according to Kerala government, has become a test case for the Stockholm Convention according to some of the delegates.

International Institute for Sustainable Development’s Reporting Service for Environment and Development Negotiations said on Wednesday that Tuesday morning’s plenary session of the conference of parties to the Convention was full and tense as it turned attention to endosulfan.

Endosulfan had hamstrung Stockholm’s sister convention, the Rotterdam Convention on prior informed consent procedure for certain hazardous chemicals and pesticides in international trade, for years. “This unfortunate precedent had many interpreting consideration of endosulfan as a significant test for the Stockholm. Will Stockholm too, succumb to politics? Have wizened parties developed new strategies to avoid political blockades? “.

As initial views were exchanged, some participants were pleased at the apparent openness of most parties to discussing the issue, other more seasoned delegates predicted long evenings ahead, the reporting service added. The contact group on endosulfan and new persistent organic pollutants, chaired by Qatar, began work in the evening on thrashing out possible exemptions associated with ban on endosulfan, notably those crop-pest complexes of particular concern to parties.

A minority of participants questioned the mandate of the group, but after confirmation from the legal advisor, continued work. While majority of the countries supported ban on endosulfan, some with riders; India has been stressing on consensus decision with the objective to postpone decision on endosulfan. Switzerland maintained that voting was an option for listing pollutants for ban. China and Japan opined that the recommendations of the Persistent Organic Pollutants Review Committee (POPRC) to the Convention should be by consensus.

POPRC Chair Reiner Arndt (Germany), who introduced POPRC’s recommendation to list endosulfan in Annex A of the Convention (for ban) with specific exemptions, noted that the recommendation was taken by consensus by all POPRC members present and voting. (India had dropped out of discussions and had not voted at the committee along with a few other countries.)

Countries of Europe, Latin American and Caribbean Group and African Group are supporting the ban. The United States, Japan, South Korea, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Oman, Argentina, Morocco, Jordan and Qatar are among the countries that expressed support for the ban during the plenary session. Cuba said the financial implications of listing must be clarified before it could support listing.

The International Stewardship Center emphasized that the proposed alternatives to endosulfan were not affordable and that its listing will be detrimental to farmers. Thanal, the non-Governmental orgnisation from Kerala, the Inuit Circumpolar Council (Canada), Pesticide Action Network and the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation welcomed the proposal for ban. The Indian Chemical Council, representing the industry, said there was insufficient scientific evidence to justify a ban.

Saturday 2 April 2011

INDIA TAKES THE WORLD CUP IN GRAND STYLE

JOY UNBOUND: M.S. Dhoni and Yuvraj Singh celebrate after guiding India to a six-wicket win in the final of the World Cup on Saturday. Dhoni was named the Man of the Match; Yuvraj was adjudged the Man of the Tournament.

India vs SriLanka Final World Cup 2011 highlights-FINAL MOMENTS:INDIA WI...

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MY PRIDE DID YOU KNOW THAT.......

India is one of the oldest civilizations in the world, spanning a period of more than 4000 years, and witnessing the fusion of several customs and traditions, which are reflective of the rich culture and heritage of the Country.

The history of the nation gives a glimpse into the magnanimity of its evolution - from a Country reeling under colonialism, to one of the leading economies in the global scenario within a span of fifty years. More than anything, the nationalistic fervour of the people is the contributing force behind the culmination of such a development. This transformation of the nation instills a sense of national pride in the heart of every Indian within the Country and abroad, and this section is a modest attempt at keeping its flame alive.

Sanskrit is considered as the mother of all higher languages.

This is because it is the most precise and therefore the suitable language for computer software (a report in Forbes magazine, July 1987)

I love thee, O my India!

Better than Heaven or Arcadia
I love thee, O my India!
And thy love I shall give
To every brother nation that lives.
God made the Earth;
Man made confining countries
And their fancy-frozen boundaries.
But with unfound boundless love
I behold the borderland of my India
Expanding into the World.
Hail, mother of religions, lotus, scenic beauty,and sages!
Thy wide doors are open,
Welcoming God's true sons through all ages.
Where Ganges, woods, Himalayan caves, and
men dream God -
I am hallowed; my body touched that sod.

- Swami Yogananda Paramhansa

Poems on India

"Where the mind is without fear
and the head is held high;
Where knowledge is free;
Where the world has not been
broken up into fragments by
narrow domestic walls;
Where words come out from
the depth of truth;
Where tireless striving stretches
its arms towards perfection;
Where the clear stream of reason
has not lost its way into the dreary
desert sand of dead habit;
Where the mind is lead forward by thee
into ever-widening thought and action-
Into that heaven of freedom, my Father,
let my country awake."

"Geetanjali"
- Rabindranath Tagore

THE PLEDGE OF INDEPENDENCE

The Pledge of Independence

Declaration of Purna Swaraj, Lahore Congress, January 26, 1930

We believe that it is the incredible right of the Indian people, as of any other people, to have freedom to enjoy the fruits of their soil and have the necessities of life, so that they may have full opportunities of growth. We believe also that if any government deprives a people of these and oppress them, the people have a further right to alter or abolish it. The British Government in India has not only deprived the Indian people of their freedom but has based itself on the exploitation of the masses, and has ruined India must server the British connection and attain Purna Swaraj or complete independence.

India has been ruined economically. The revenue derived from our people is out of all proportion to our income. Our average income is seven pice per day, and of the heavy taxes we pay 20% are raised from the land revenue derived from the peasantry and 3% from the salt tax, which falls most heavily on the poor.

Village industries, such as hand spinning, have been destroyed, leaving the peasantry idle for at least four months in the year, and dulling their intellect for want of handicrafts, and nothing has been substituted, as in other countries, for the crafts thus destroyed.

Customs and currency have been so manipulated as to beep further burdens on the peasantry. British manufactured goods constitute the bulk of our imports. Customs duties betray partiality for British manufacturers, and revenue from them is not used to lessen the burden on the masses but for sustaining a highly extravagant administration. Still more arbitrary has been the manipulation of the exchange which has resulted in millions being drained away from the country.

Politically, India’s status has never been so reduced as under the British regime. No reforms have given real political power to the people. The tallest of us have to bend before the foreign authority. The rights of free expression of opinion and free association have been denied to us and many of our countrymen are compelled to live in exile abroad and cannot return to their homes. All administrative talent is killed and the masses have to be satisfied petty village offices and clerkships.

Currently, the system of education has torn us from our moorings and our training has made us bug the very chains that bind us.

Spiritually, compulsory disarmament has made us unmanly and the presence of an alien army of occupation, employed with deadly effect to crush in us the spirit of resistance, has made us think that we cannot look after ourselves or put up a defence against foreign aggression, or even defend our brothers and families from the attacks of thieves, robbers and miscreants.

We hold it to be a crime against man and God to submit any longer to a rule that has caused this fourfold disaster to our country. We recognise, however, that the most effective way of getting our freedom is not through violence. We will therefore prepare ourselves by withdrawing, so far as we can, all voluntary association from British Government, and will prepare for civil disobedience, including non-payment of taxes. We are convinced that if we can but withdraw our voluntary help and stop payment of taxes without doing violence, even under provocation; the need of his inhuman rule is assured. We therefore hereby solemnly resolve to carry out the Congress instructions issued from time to time for the purpose of establishing Purna Swaraj.

Poverty and Hungry has no RELIGION

Another strange qualification to become an OBC was, if one belonged to a caste where at least 25 per cent females and 10 per cent males above the state average got married at an age below 17 years in rural areas and at least 10 per cent females and 5 per cent males do so in urban areas. Besides this one of the selection parameter remained, “Castes/classes considered as socially backward by others.” Who are others and how this would be identified was never mentioned. No scientific methodology, nothing.