sharpeye

Patna-Indore Express Tragedy Dr Arvind Kumar* *President, Indi Water Foundation, New Delhi. Recent Patna-Indore Express tragedy is a national calamity that has claimed about 150 deaths and many scores of people have sustained injuries. Undoubtedly, government has announced monetary compensation to the next of the kin and ex-gratia grants to those injured in this tragedy; nevertheless, this is not going to lessen the pain of those aggrieved families. Political parties should refrain from taking political mileage out of this tragedy; rather impress upon the ruling dispensation the necessity of introducing reforms in the Indian Railways, which is the largest employer in the public sector along with speeding up the programme of modernization. Prior to embarking on ambitious programmes like bullet train, it would be advisable to improve infrastructure facilities on the existing Railway system and make it more viable and efficient along with facilitating rail connectivity i...

India’s inclusion as the 35th member of the Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR), an exclusive club of countries controlling exports in missile technology, which comes days after China stalled India's entry into nuke club NSG, is a welcome move. India’s membership of the MTCR will enable it to deal in high-end missile technology. China is not a member of the MTCR, however. Beijing's application to join the MTCR is pending, affording an opportunity for New D elhi to use it as a bargaining chip with China. In the aftermath of testing diplomatic waters in Beijing, India should pursue well-concerted farsighted diplomacy, especially with China, in making optimum gains with minimal efforts. Unlike the past when India showed its magnanimity in extending unconditional support to China’s induction into the UN, accepting Chinese suzerainty over Tibet and one-China policy, India should augment its bargaining power vis-à-vis China in international arena by enhancing its econ...

International Women’s Day We salute women power on the occasion of International Women’s Day for their role and significant contribution in maintaining international peace, security, their dedication to society and maintenance of environmental equilibrium. Despite the immense progress attained by women in many parts of the globe, still more needs to be done for them, especially in rural areas specifically in making safe drinking water accessible to them. In many parts of the world, including India, women have to trek long distances to fetch potable water for the family. In view of the fast depleting groundwater resources and contamination of surface water resources, it is becoming more cumbersome for rural women folk to have access to safe drinking water resources. On this occasion, let’s pledge to address this problem more seriously. There is also need to build capacities of rural female folks in water conservation and judicious use of water as well as keeping water resources ...

Boston: The damaging climate consequences of carbon emissions will grow and persist for millennia without a dramatic new global energy strategy, a new study has warned. Rising global temperatures, ice field and glacial melting and rising sea levels are among the climatic changes that could ultimately lead to the submergence of coastal areas home to 1.3 billion people today, researchers said. "What our analysis shows is that this era of global warming will be as big as the end of the Ice Age. And what we are seeing is a massive departure from the environmental stability civilisation has enjoyed during the last 10,000 years of its development," said Jeremy Shakun from Boston College in the US. For the study, an international team of researchers generated new scenarios for temperature rise, glacial melting, sea-level rise and coastal flooding based on state-of-the-art climate and ice sheet models. They used a projected global output of 1,280 billion tonnes of carbon ...