Social audit empowers Odisha’s rural poor

With only two members enrolled in her public distribution system (PDS) ration card, Balmati Bhumia had to feed her five-member family with only 10 kg of rice distributed under the National Food Security Act (NFSA) 2013. Names of three of her children didn’t feature in the card despite grievances filed at the gram panchayat (village council) office.

Forest food ensures nutritional security of Odisha’s tribes

Access to naturally grown forest produce would go a long way in protecting tribal communities in Odisha from the worst impacts of climate change and supply them with all that they need for sustenance

Sunamai Mambalaka, a Kondh tribal woman in her 50s, is not bothered about the vulnerability of cultivated crops to climate change. She believes that she and her community will never experience hunger as long as the forest, their perennial source of food, exists. “I was born in the forest, I grew with the forest. Forest is our life and soul,” she said.

Tribal women of Sundargarh make organic farming a life-changing economic activity

Tribal communities in Sundargarh district of Odisha have revived the traditional practice of growing food without the help of chemical fertilizers and made it viable economically by making pragmatic changes.

Nirmala Barla (40), a passionate farmer of Sundargarh district’s Brahmanamara village, is a proud woman because she feeds her family with a variety of safely grown food, and not just cereals grown by using lots of chemical fertilizers that are available in the market. In her 14 acres of land, both upland and relatively plain, she grows rice, millet and vegetables without using any inorganic fertilizer. After meeting consumption needs of the family, she is also able to earn a bit by selling the surplus farm produce.

Interventions to stop child marriages raise hopes in Odisha

The practice of underage marriage is acute in the tribal-dominated southern and southwestern parts of Odisha, but interventions on the ground are planting the seeds of change among adolescent girls and their parents

The pensive look on the face of three-year-old Devati Durua of Chanchraguda village in Koraput district could very well change to distress if she is married before she comes of age at 18. That remains a distinct possibility in the underdeveloped area where indigenous people are known to widely practice child marriage.

The Modi Government’s war on environment

The Modi Government is pushing through reforms that weaken India’s existing environmental laws and threaten the rights of those who rely on the forests for their livelihoods.

Despite the bold warning from the recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report of the catastrophic impacts of rising temperature on the global climate, Narendra Modi's Government is all set to enact changes to weaken the existing environment and land acquisition laws of India, in order to promote industrialisation and ensure high economic growth, allege activists and environmental experts.