|
|
|
|
|
|
Economic Highlights
Right To Information Act:CITIZENS ARE EMPOWERED, by T.D. Jagadesan, 15 October 2005 |
|
|
PEOPLE AND THEIR PROBLEMS
New Delhi, 15 October 2005
Right To
Information Act
CITIZENS ARE
EMPOWERED
By T.D. Jagadesan
A simple yet powerful example of the use of Right to
Information (RTI) is of a slum dweller who applied for a new ration card. He was told he would have to give a bribe of
Rs. 2,000 to obtain it. A friend, an
RTI-empowered citizen smiled and just went ahead and applied for the ration
card without meeting the demand. His
neighbours warned him he would never get his ration card. They also told him how he would now have to
keep visiting the rationing office.
Some well-meaning friends praised him for being
courageous. They suggested he should
approach some non-governmental organization to take up his case. He had decided to become an enforcer of good
governance. Some weeks later he applied
for information under the RTI.
Using the simple format with an application fee of Rs. 10,
he delivered it to the Public Information Officer of the Food and Supply
Office. He had asked up to which date
applications for ration cards had been cleared and the daily progress report of
his application.
This shook the officials, since they would have to
acknowledge in writing that they had given ration cards to others who had applied
after him, which would be a conclusive evidence that they had no justification
for delaying his card. Happy ending: the
ration card was given to him immediately.
No bribes, no endless visits. Our
citizen was able to use the might of the Right to Information. This story has been repeated a thousand times
to get a road repaired, an electricity connection and admissions to educational
institutions.
The Right to Information is derived from our fundamental
right of expression under Article 19. If
we do not have information on how our Government and public institutions
function, we cannot express any informed opinion on it. This has been accepted by various Supreme
Court judgments since 1977. All of us accept
that the freedom of the Press is an essential element for a democracy.
Why is the freedom of the media considered one of the
essential features of a democracy?
Democracy revolves round the basic idea of citizens being at the centre
of the governance: rule of the people.
We need to define the importance of the concept of freedom of the Press
from this fundamental premise.
Justice Mathew, it will be recalled, ruled in the Raj Narain
case that “in a Government of responsibility like ours, where all the agents of
the public must be responsible for their conduct, there can be but few
secrets. The people of this country have
a right to know every public act, everything that is done in a public way by
their public functionaries. They are
entitled to know the particulars of every public transaction in all its
bearing. Their right to know, which is
derived from the concept of freedom of speech, though not absolute, is a factor
which should make one wary when secrecy is claimed for transactions which can
at any rate have no repercussion on public security.”
Nine States in India have in operation the Right
to Information Act. Parliament passed
this as Act in May this year. It became
operational across the country on October 12.
It promises to be a single piece of legislation that can result in the
victory of participatory democracy.
The right to Information Act is a codification of this
important right of citizens. The right
has existed since the time India
became a republic, but was difficult to enforce without going to court. The Act and its rules define a format for
requisitioning information, in a time frame within which information must be
provided (30 days). Method of giving the
information, some charges for applying, and some exemptions. The principle is that charges should be
minimum – more as a token.
They are not at all representative of the costs that may be
incurred. Citizens can ask for
information by getting Xerox copies of documents, permissions, policies, and
decisions. All administrative offices of
public authorities have to appoint “Public Information Officers (PIO). Citizens can apply information to the PIO of
the office concerned.
If it is not provided or is refused, the citizen can go to
an Appellate Authority who would be an official in the same department, senior
to the PIO. If this too does not produce
a satisfactory result, one can appeal to the State or Central Information
Commissioner, an independent Constitutional Authority being established under
the Act.
One of the major reasons for the success of the Maharashtra and Delhi Acts is that there is a provision
for penalising the PIO in case he does not give the information within the
mandated period. The Legislation, which
has drawn a lot of inspiration from The Maharashtra Act, also provides for a
penalty for delay on the PIO at a rate of Rs.250 a day. There is also provision for disciplinary
action against recalcitrant PIOs in some cases.
Thus, the Right to Information provides for a time bound
defined process for citizens to access information about all actions taken by
public authorities. The penal provisions
are the real teeth of the Act, which ensure that the PIO does not treat
citizens’ demands for information in a cavalier manner.
It has been possible to get a Commission report to be made
public, using the RTI. In another case,
a police Inspector had raped a minor and was reinstated in service within five
months: Using the RTI as a pressure
device resulted in the Inspector being dismissed from service. In another instance, proof has been obtained
about political interference in police transfers.
The major fraud of looting money meant for providing
livelihood under the Employment Guarantee Scheme (ESG) has been going on for
years. Presently, a campaign has been
initiated in Maharashtra to get citizens
across the State to ask for EGS roll using the RTI and then auditing them with
people’s participation. The primary
power of the RTI is the fact it empowers individual citizens to requisition
information.
Hence, without necessarily forming pressure groups or
associations, it puts power directly into the hands of the foundation of
democracy-the citizens. There will
certainly be an attempt to subvert this revolutionary right by the ruling
coterie, since it strikes at the basics of their power.
This can easily be countered, if enough citizens use the
Act. Citizens can use the Right from
their own houses and usually it does not take more than about two hours to make
an RTI application. A few million
applications across the country by concerned citizens on issues that interest
them will bring a major change in India and be a determined move
towards the Swaraj we desire.
There is a great need to spread the usage of this
countrywide, so that transparency and good governance triumph. We now have the power; we only need to use
it. It is simple to use, and the
benefits are immense.---INFA
(Copyright,
India News and Feature Alliance)
|
|
Hydrogen Energy Source:TOWARDS CLEAN & GREEN ENERGY FUTURE, Radhakrishna Rao, 7 October, 2005 |
|
|
PEOPLE AND THEIR PROBLEMS
New Delhi, 7 October, 2005
Hydrogen Energy
Source
TOWARDS CLEAN &
GREEN ENERGY FUTURE
By Radhakrishna Rao
The skyrocketing price of the crude oil in the international
market continues to impose a heavy strain on the economy of several third world
countries, including India,
which are fully dependent on petrol and diesel to meet the energy needs of
their transport and industrial sector.
Apart from their high cost, the fossil fuels also play a key role in
befouling the atmosphere in the urban areas through the release of many harmful
pollutants that are a source of health hazards.
Indeed, a study carried out in the United States
says that if the transport sector in the country goes in for
environmental-friendly energy sources in lieu of the currently used fossil
fuels, there could be a drastic decline in the incidence of asthma, respiratory
disorders and other potentially life-threatening afflictions.
The study carried out by Mark Jacobson and his colleagues at
Stanford University pleaded for the speedy
introduction of hydrogen fuel as a replacement to oil. It pointed out that such a step could reduce
death by over 6,000 a year in the country.
Of course, Jacobson and his colleagues envision an era where all the
vehicles in the US
will be powered by hydrogen fuel to herald a clean and green energy
future.
As it is for the last four decades, spaceships and launch
vehicles have been routinely employing the high performance cryogenic engine
propelled by the energy released from the burning of hydrogen. But the costly and complicated cryogenic
engine technology used for space propulsion cannot be adopted easily for
driving vehicles or running computers.
However, by combing
hydrogen fuel with oxygen it is possible to generate a large quantity of
electricity along with pure water as an exhaust. The water so produced is in such a state of
purity that astronauts onboard the US space shuttle used to drink the
water so produced without hesitation.
Thanks to a project funded by the USAID (United States
Agency for International Development), the Pune-based Bajaj Auto Ltd. joined
hands with the Energy Conversion Device of Troy in Michigin to develop a fully
hydrogen fuel powered autorikshaw concerns the conversion of its conventional
combustion engine into the one capable of using hydrogen as an alternate fuel.
Indeed, this new avatar
of the three wheeler has been projected as a major initiative towards minimizing
the rigours of climatic changes brought about by an increased emission of green
house gases. For many years now, burning
of fossil fuels has been considered a major contributor to the increasing
volume of green house gases circulating in the global atmosphere.
Despite many constrains, the hydrogen fuel cell technology
envisioned by Geoffrey Ballad is slowly gaining in popularity with many of the
automobile giants taking up high profile projects to develop a commercially
viable and functionally efficient hydrogen fuel cell system. As it is, fuel cell is just like any other
battery to the extent it generates electricity to propel a vehicle in the
desired direction. However,
technological constraints and cost factors are impeding the popularization of
hydrogen fuel cell as a source of clean energy to drive an increasing number of
vehicles on the roads of the world.
Though a variety of fuel cell types are in vogue, all of
them function on somewhat similar principle.
To begin with, the hydrogen is fed into the anode where a catalyst
separates hydrogen’s negatively charged electrons from positively charges
ions. Thereafter, electrons are made to
move through the electrolyte to cathode to combine with oxygen to produce
electricity and water. A hydrogen fuel
cell can be kept operational without let or hindrance by refueling it with
hydrogen obtained from a convenient source.
Obviously, hydrogen is considered both renewable and
eco-friendly. However, the biggest
hindrance in the mass use of hydrogen fuel cell is the lack of practical
storage methods. For the fuel cells to
be functionally efficient need to be maintained either at an extremely low
temperature or at a high pressure. Right
at the moment, some of the major thrust areas of research aimed at turning
hydrogen fuel cell into a popular energy source include increasing the power to
weight density, zeroing in low cost and high performance material, reducing the
complexity and streamlining manufacturing process for an economically viable
production of hydrogen fuel cells.
Use of Nano technology and smart materials are expected to
lead to the development of fuel cells whose energy generation “Hydrogen is the
most abundant element in the universe” says David Mao, a visiting scientist in
Geophysical Sciences at the University of Chicago. He along with the graduate student Wendy Mao
has developed an icy material made of molecular hydrogen that requires less
stringent temperature and pressure storage condition for operation. “The new class of compounds, offer a possible
alternate route for technologically useful hydrogen storage” says Russel
Hemley, a senior scientist at the Geophysical Laboratory of the Carnegie
Institute in Washington.
On the other hand, researchers at the Texas Centre for Superconductivity
and Advanced Materials of University of Houston have engineered a method to
devise a “solid oxide” fuel cell that functions at half the temperature of the
currently operational hydrogen fuel cell systems. Both General Motor (GM) and Boeing are
working towards developing hydrogen fuel cells and hope to hit the target by
2010. As it is GM has achieved some
success in demonstrating that compressed hydrogen and wire technology could
benefit automobile uses to a large extent.
Some fine-tuning regarding the cost, reliability and ability
to store hydrogen in cars could make thing smooth for use of fuel cells as the
convenient driving energy source. Boeing
on the other hand is keen on engineering a hydrogen fuel cell for use in
aircraft. But Boeing had made it clear
that at the present level of technological growth, hydrogen fuel cells are not
economically viable option for aircraft.
The California-based outfit Ultra Cell has succeeded in
developing a light weight and high performance hydrogen fuel cell weighing just
1.3 kg. In fact, Ultra Cell achieved a
breakthrough in converting methanol into hydrogen inside the device to generate
power. But the hindrance is that this
involves a chemical reaction running at about 280 degrees Celsius. As such the crux of the problem is how to
minimize the temperature to render the system an operationally viable
unit.
In the ultimate analysis, a number of technological
challenges need to be surmounted to create an ideal hydrogen fuel cell wherein
hydrogen combines with oxygen to produce power within the permissible range of
pressure and temperature. And, of
course, the cost of a hydrogen fuel cell would also need to be brought down by
a substantial extent in order to make it a popular energy source.---INFA
(Copyright, India News and feature
Alliance)
|
|
Poverty Alleviation Plan:EXPLOITING POTENTIALS OF BAMBOO, by Radhakrishna Rao,11 November 2005 |
|
|
PEOPLE AND THEIR PROBLEMS
New Delhi, 11 November 2005
Poverty Alleviation
Plan
EXPLOITING POTENTIALS
OF BAMBOO
By Radhakrishna Rao
Hailed as the “green fold of the forest” and “poor man’s
timber”, the lean, tall and gracious bamboo is an eco-friendly natural resource
of great utility which has been meeting a wide ranging needs of human society from time immemorial. China, on its
part, has succeeded in turning bamboo into a lucrative foreign exchange earner
through the production and export of many innovative bamboo products.
India which has the second highest
resource of bamboo in the world, is also planning to make it big in the global market for bamboo
products. But then there is a huge demand and supply gap insofar as bamboo is
concerned. Right now, the supply of bamboo is about 13.47-million tonnes, while
the demand is pegged at 26.9-million tonnes.
Indian hopes to overcome the gap by raising commercial
bamboo plantations. The Union Government, on its part, has unveiled a national
mission on bamboo trade and technology under which thrust is being given to the
production of innovative items and their marketing. The major objective of the
mission is to serve “as an instrument of poverty alleviation and employment
generation, particularly in the rural areas.”
In recent years, there has been a growing emphasis on promoting
the cultivation of bamboo varieties. Bamboo which has traditionally been used
in paper and rayon production, is now being used to build dwellings in many
parts of the world. Bamboo is also now used to make match-sticks and incense
sticks. By 2015, the Indian bamboo industry is estimated to grow to
US$5.7-billion sector as against US$174-million sector in 2000”, says a
spokesman of International Network for Bamboo and Ratan (INBAR).
Indian paper industry which has for long been dependent on
bamboo as a cheap raw material has to go in for costlier feedstock in the
context of the acute shortage of bamboo in the country. Bamboo forests in India cover
10.03-million hectares making for 12.8 per cent of forest area in the country.
A large proportion of the tribal population in the country
is dependent on bamboo for its livelihood. In Karnataka, Medhara tribals who
have been for centuries making a living by bamboo products, are finding it
difficult to make both the ends meet on account of an acute shortage of bamboo.
The hilly, north-eastern
region of India accounts for two-thirds of the total bamboo
stock in the country. But in the absence of a well-organized production
facility and marketing network people in many part of north east India are not
in a position to exploit the economic
potentials of this eco-friendly forest species .Meanwhile, there is a concern in
part of north-east India over the bamboo flowering expected to take place
during 2006-07. For bamboo flowering in this part of the country has been
associated with rat infestations and famine. For rat invasion is known to
follow bamboo flowering In fact, way back in 1959, bamboo flowering in Mizoram
led to widespread starvation leading to the separatist movement. Scientists, on their part, point out that the “gregarious
bamboo flowering” causes widespread ecological havocs.
Perhaps, no other natural species is used to make as many
products as bamboo .From the traditional weapons of the aboriginals to the
scaffoldings of modern high rise buildings, bamboo continues to play its role
in human civilization. This noble grass
can be made into baskets and
chairs, chopsticks, hats and ladders. Thus, the use to which the bamboo
can be put is endless. As the 800 year
old Chinese philosopher, Poo-Son-Tong
said ,”A meal should have a meat but a house must have a bamboo Without
bamboo, we lose serenity and culture
itself”.
Depending on the species, the bamboo flowering takes place
anywhere between 60 and 120 years
.Flowering is spread over a year or two
and is gregarious nature. The bamboo
dies after flowering because the old leaves fall and instead of followed by regeneration are replaced by
flowers.
Indonesia is the world’s largest producer of bamboo. About
half-a-million people in South-East Asia derive their employment directly from
the bamboo cultivation, extraction and processing. From birth to death, bamboo plays a crucial role in the lives of
the millions of people in South East Asia.
Incidentally, the destruction of bamboo forests also means a
severe disturbance in the fine-tuned eco-system of a closed forest. A host of
animals from weevils to wild elephants, feed on bamboo flowers that carpet the
floor of the forests. The disappearance of bamboo forests also leads to the growth of invidious weed eupatorium
glandulosum, particularly in the moist parts of the forest .Once the compact
weeds take over, it smothers the and totally suppresses all other vegetation
In Bangalore, the Indian Plywood Industry Research and
Training Institute has developed the
technological elements for building dwellings with the reinforced bamboo. There
is a move to popularize the cost-efficient and eco-friendly bamboo houses in
both the rural and urban areas of India. The Bangkok-based Asian Institute of
Technology (AIT) has played a key role in popularizing bamboo houses in rural
pockets of Thailand with a high degree of success. ….INFA
(Copyright, India News and Feature
Alliance)
|
|
Future Of Genetic Medicine:FORAYS INTO STEM CELL RESEARCH, by Radhakrishna Rao,30 September 2005 |
|
|
PEOPLE AND THEIR PROBLEMS
New Delhi, 30 September 2005
Future Of Genetic
Medicine
FORAYS INTO STEM
CELL RESEARCH
By Radhakrishna Rao
A number of initiatives spearheaded by both the Government-funded
agencies and private sector outfits in India are all set to give a new
direction and orientation to the state-of-the-art stem cell research described as
the future of medical science. For quite sometime now, there has been a growing
realization of the need to foster and strengthen public private partnership to
sustain the tempo of stem cell research which calls for a huge investment and creation
of research facilities.
“Public-private partnership is inevitable for sustainability
due to high cost involved in stem cell research” says Dr.Chander P.Puri, Director
of the Mumbai based National Institute for Research in Reproductive Health
(NIRH), which functions under the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR). Interestingly,
the Union Health Ministry has sanctioned a grant of Rs.5-million to NIRH to
help set up a well-equipped stem cell research facility in Mumbai.
On its part, the Union Health Ministry is in dialogue with
the privately-owned Korean research enterprise Histostem for setting up four
umbilical cord blood banks in India.
Incidentally, cryo storage of umbilical cord, the richest source of stem cells,
is gaining in popularity. Described as a bio-insurance the stored umbilical
cord stem cells can be used to set right many of the hitherto incurable
afflictions at any point of the life of an individual. The stem cell bank has been described as the
future of genetic medicine.
As pointed out by Dr.A.Ramdoss, Union Health and Family
Welfare Minister, human stem cell banking in India could receive a boost in the
country if 2.5-crore waste umbilical cord were cryo-frozen and later used for
stem cell research. “There is a need to stop this wastage and these could be channelized to stem cell banks”, he said.
For many years now, bio-medical researchers have been
envisioning the use of stem cells to cure degenerate disorders including
Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s. Researchers have found that these cells when
injected into the affected areas begin replicating and transforming into cells
of the organ, in the process recovering the degenerate disease.
In a significant breakthrough the New Delhi-based All India
Institute of Medical Science (AIIMS) has pioneered a novel injection method for
an effective stem cell therapy. This
innovative technique perfected by doctors at this prestigious Institute helps
to deliver the stem cells to the site of the diseased organ in patient
suffering from a variety of ailments.
According the AIIMS sources, the specialized stem cells that
are versatile enough to perform a variety of functions initiate the process of
repair and regeneration of diseases cells.
This, in turn, substantially brings down the severity of disease. Over the last two years, more than 30
patients suffering from heart-related ailments were subjected to stem cell
treatment. In majority of cases, the
dead heart muscles of the patients were revived. It has held out the hope of setting right
several immune related disorders and degenerate diseases.
In Banglore, the Manipal
Hospital is planning to
carry out stem cell-based trial to tackle neurological and other
disorders. According to Satish Totey,
Director of Stem Cell Research Centre at the Hospital, trials will be conducted
for persons suffering from myocardial infraction, spinal cord injury,
peripheral arterial diseases and optic nerve.
On another front, Appolo hospital group has tied up with
Histostem to set up a stem cell therapy Centre which will make use of the cord
blood. Reliance Life Sciences in Mumbai, National Centre for Biological Science
and Pune-based National Centre for Life Sciences are some of the major centers
of excellence in the area of stem cell research. On its part, Reliance Life Sciences has revealed
that it will invest Rs.200 million for speeding up stem cell research.
The Hyderabad-based L.V. Prasad Eye Institute is among the
few medical centers in the world that have been putting the fruits of stem cell
research to the good use. Here doctors
take about one millimeter limbal tissue from the healthy eye of the patient,
culture them on an appropriate surface and graft it on to the diseased
eye.
The Banglore-based Cryostem Karnataka Pvt. Ltd, which is
both a cord stem cell bank and research center has entered into an agreement
with Malasia’s Stem Life to expand the scope of its research and development
activities. This tie up is expected to
pave way for opening up the stem cell transplantation facilities in various
parts of S.E. Asia. “This tie up with
Stem Life is important and will strengthen our endeavour in fighting the
disease that don’t have a cure and those include Parkinson’s disease,
Alzhiemer’s, diabetes and myocardial infarction” says Dr. S.G.A. Rao, Chairman
of Managing Director of Cryostem Karnataka.
Basically, stem cells are considered wonder cells that are
capable of developing into any of more than 200 cell types that make up the
human body. As such stem cell research
offers potential of replacing the “faulty” and “malfunctioning” tissues and
pave way for curing the hitherto incurable diseases. Stem cells grow into virtually and kind of
tissue in human body when properly nurtured.
The new stem cell lines, researchers hope, can replace the old ones and
worn out cells within the human body, serving as a miracle cure for
degenerative diseases.
All said and done, many aspects and features of stem cells
continue to puzzle researchers. As
pointed out by Dr. Peter A. Andrews, Chairman of the International Stem Cell
Forum, “The basic science of stem cell biology is still not fully well
understood. By and large, people today
know how to derive stem cell but we do not know what exactly do they do and how
to control them. We do not know how to
keep them in desired state so that they can be used when needed. All this will take time, perhaps the normal
span in any new treatment.
With the US restricting the scope of stem cell research
under pressure from Christian fundamentalists, countries such as India, South
Korea, China and Japan are expected to take lead in this vital research could
prove costly for the USA which seems to buckling under the influence of
Christian Taliban.---INFA
(Copyright,
India News and Features Alliance)
|
|
Children’s Death-Trap:VICTIMS OF ENVIRONMENTAL POLLUTION, by Radhakrishna Rao,16 September 2005 |
|
|
PEOPLE
AND THEIR PROBLEMS
NEW DELHI, 16 September 2005
Children’s Death-Trap
VICTIMS OF ENVIRONMENTAL POLLUTION
By Radhakrishna Rao
An
increasing number of children get seriously affected or killed by pollution,
unsafe water and poor sanitation the world over. In many urban centre of the
world, a high content of led in the air -- a fall out of the explosive growth
in the numbers of fossil fuel driven motor vehicles-- is known to cause a
variety of physical and mental disorders among the school-going children.
Similarly, polluted and unsafe water kills hundreds of thousands of children
across the world. Even the industrially developed countries of Europe are not immune to this
global trend.
According
to public health experts, environmental pollution and unsafe water are major factors
leading to one-third of child and adolescent deaths in many parts of Europe. As it is, pollution from burning coal and wood
used to heat individual homes during the peak winter season is a major killer of
children in the Central
Asian Republic.
On the other hand, polluted water and poor sanitation have been found to be the
major cause of death in East European countries. "One third of all death
of children and adolescents in the European region can be attributed to
environmental factors," points out Giorgio Tamburlini of the Institute of Child Health
in Trieste, Italy.
On
the other hand, an extensive field study conducted by the World Health Organization
(WHO) comes to the conclusion that one lakh deaths and six million years of
healthy life are lost each year in children from birth to the 19th year of age
in many parts of Europe. "This is the
first assessment of the health effect in children and adolescents of
environmental factors in the European region" says a report published in
the reputed medical journal Lancet.
Indeed,
medical researchers drive home the point that children are more susceptible to the
effects of environmental hazards because they live and play closer to the
ground and have less control over their environment. About 23,000 children up to
four years of age die from pneumonia and other respiratory disorders that have
their roots in indoor and outdoor pollution. "Intervention is able to
reduce the exposure to children to risk factors, ranging from outdoor and
indoor pollution to lack of safe water to unsafe housing and transport are
going to produce substantial benefits in terms of disease, disability and
death" says Tamburlini.
In a
significant finding, a team of scientists in the United Kingdom has proved that the
harmful atmospheric pollutants could cross the placenta to affect the
developing foetus. According to Prof. Alan Pruce, Professor of Medical Physics
at the University
of Bristol, the unborn
child is particularly sensitive to the effects of the mother's response to environmental
agents through placenta transfer. As pointed out by Pruce, "We found that
foetal organ concentration can exceed those of the mothers which may have
implications due to the increment sensitivity of the foetus. The exact levels
are as yet unknown but we know that childhood leukaemia is initiated ".
It
has also been demonstrated that environmental pollutants can play a role in
causing damages to the genetic material in a child in the womb if its mother
breathes polluted air. "This is the first study to show that environmental
exposure to specific combination of pollutants during pregnancy can result in
chromosomal abnormalities in foetal tissue" says Kenneth Oldem, Director
of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences.
As
researchers observe the damage to the chromosomes tends to linger, making
people more susceptible to cancerous disorders. Many studies in various parts
of the world, have come to the solid conclusion that pollutants could cause
genetic changes leading to the onset of leukaemia and other forms of
cancer." While we cannot estimate the precise increase in the cancer risk,
our findings underscore the need for policy makers to take appropriate measures
to protect children from these avoidable exposure" says Dr. Frederic Perera
of the Columbia University's
Centre for Children's Environmental Health in New York.
Studies
carried elsewhere in the US
go to show that the school going children exposed to diesel exhaust fumes while traveling to the
schools during a school year of up to 200 days, had to face a higher risk of
respiratory disorders. Nearer home, a study of about 20,000 school going
children carried out in Bangalore
showed that they faced an increased risk of respiratory disorders. According to
Ameer Ahmed, an environmental engineer the high prevalence of diesel
particulate matter in the air in cities such as Bangalore is a matter of serious concern. He
feels that there are still no stringent quality checks on emission levels of
the vehicles in India.
---- INFA
(Copyright India News and Feature Alliance)
|
|
| | << Start < Previous 601 602 603 604 605 606 607 608 609 610 Next > End >>
| Results 5464 - 5472 of 6263 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|