With forest cover projected to shrink in the elephant landscape of northeast India, conservationists and a handful of growers of the iconic Assam and Darjeeling teas are experimenting with a…
Underpinned by the message of “good-over-evil”, Durga puja or the worship of goddess Durga, is one of the most important event in the religious calendar in east India. In contemporary times,…
The primary source of agarwood and one of the world’s most expensive trees, the evergreen agar tree (Aquilaria malaccensis Lam.) is a step away from extinction in the wild. In…
The frequency of extreme weather events is going up around the world, and droughts and heatwaves are no exception. When the globe warms by 3-4 degrees - a possibility during…
Recurring ethno-political violence that rocked Assam’s Manas National Park (MNP), in the Bhutan-Himalayan foothills, from the late 1980s till 2003 changed the spread and abundance of wildlife, including royal Bengal…
Two months of the annual southwest monsoon are over, with another two to go. As against a normal rainfall of 452.8 millimetres (mm), the country has received 426.1 mm rainfall,…
It’s 5 AM and Officer Zorba is reporting for duty at Kaziranga National Park, the global stronghold of the one-horned rhino (Rhinoceros unicornis) and the epicentre of a fierce battle…
This is the second article in a two-part series on poaching in Jaldapara National Park. In Part One, interviews with former poachers revealed the inner workings of wildlife trafficking in…
This is the first article in a two-part series on poaching in Jaldapara National Park. Part Two (published on 28-May) looks at prevention and enforcement efforts. JALDAPARA NATIONAL PARK, India…
Hemmed in by rapacious quarrying and river erosion, India’s Kaziranga National Park (KNP) that harbours the world’s largest population of great Indian one-horned rhinoceros (Rhinoceros unicornis), is at a “high…
In 1980, the social forestry wing of the Assam state forest department in northeastern India launched an experimental programme that aimed to measure how well tree cover could protect against…
Our best friend could mean a matter of life and death to wildlife. A pan-India survey has sniffed out data on domestic dogs attacking as many as 80 species, including…
Environmental activists have expressed dismay at the partial demolition of a wall built by an oil refinery that they hoped would be completely pulled down. The wall, they contend, blocks…
Smallest among wild pigs, the shy and secretive pygmy hogs (Porcula salvania) are found nowhere else in India except in Assam and number only a few hundred. To ensure their…
Thirty-six vultures, including those belonging to two critically endangered species, were killed in an alleged illegal bait-poisoning incident in Assam. Thirty-six of the scavengers succumbed after consuming poison-laced goat carrion…
As the growing demand for natural rubber transforms Southeast Asia’s landscapes, scientists in India have warned against the unregulated expansion of rubber monocultures in seven northeastern states that together make…
Diprupa Bhaktiari is a change-maker in Assam’s arsenic-hit Mazgaon village along the north bank of the Brahmaputra. For over a year, she has been operating a humble filtration unit that…
Abnormal temperature fluctuations have thrown Manjita Basumatary and her fellow silk farmers from Assam in a tizzy. The rearers of the famed golden muga silk have had to shift the…
India has recorded a one percent jump (8,021 square km) in overall forest and tree cover between 2015 and 2017 despite population and livestock pressures, even as the green footprint…
In the foothills of the eastern Himalayas in Assam, Mahan Chandra Borah, is racing against time to stock up nearly-extinct and rare indigenous rice varieties, one grain at a time,…