tehelka has a good story on the raigad SEZ. if you can recall the farmers of raigad voted overwhelmingly against the SEZ which will throw several thousands farmers out of their livelihood in name of fake development back in late 2008.

SEZ, as this blog had chronicled in several cases, is the biggest fraud and land grab against rural india. it was a surprise to see for me that congress, the party that architected this dangerous land grab still was able to sustain its rural vote.

raigad case will prove whether our courts will show that corporate land grab is a no-go zone for rural india (or) in name of fake development anything and everything sells.

here is an interview of the new minister of environment and forests.

he hits the nail on its head when he says and i quote "I am neither business-friendly nor business-hostile. Not here to impede growth. Not here to accelerate it."

that's exactly the point. as head of a very crucial ministry who is responsible for safeguarding the livelihood of hundreds of million of people who depend on india's rivers, wetlands, forests, coastal areas, etc, the ministry of environment and forests is very crucial in protecting these vital pillars so that they do not get destroyed mindless money making ventures that make the rich more richer.

the job of moef is simple. protect, preserve and nourish our ecosystems so that the people who depend on them can benefit in a sustainable long term manner and not the looters who come in to kill and make fast moolah.

for that the 'businessmen and investors' can always go to dalal street and wall street right so that they can risk and play in toxic assets in order to get mindless growth? and come begging for bail out's after that :-)

here is an interesting article on how the green tribunal (aka national environment appellate authority) worked.

hopefully things will change under the new moef minister mr.jairam ramesh. after disastrous years of having moef ministers who treated their work as casual and junk, hopefully this crucial ministry will get due attention under the new moef.