Word: lands
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 2000-2009
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...heard of rich India and poor India, a land of high-tech workers and slum dwellers alike. This is a story about a third India that exists at the nexus of the two, which feeds off the excesses of the country's new wealth and preys on its most vulnerable. It is the story of the Naxalites, a Maoist insurgency that has grown from the margins four decades ago to become, in the words of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, "the single biggest internal security challenge ever faced by our country." It is a tale of ideology and mafia-like thuggery...
...inhabitants of these villages are known as Adivasis, or "original dwellers." Most Indians call them tribals, a category that doesn't even register in India's complicated caste pecking order but stands outside it. The British colonial rulers treated Adivasis as encroachers on the very land they had occupied for generations, a legal absurdity that India's current government has only recently corrected. Adivasis are entitled to reserved places in universities and government jobs but they remain among India's poorest and most marginalized. In village after village on our journey, the only visible sign of a government presence...
...years we have been here but we don't have rights and the government does nothing for us: no health, no education, no services. They don't come here," Deva said. "At the same time they don't respect us. They say they can give out rights to this land to mining companies and they have the power to do that...
...Government security officials and independent observers say the Naxalites have begun to reorganize along more formal military lines. The rebels still use bows and arrows, knives and ancient rifles, but have begun to stock up on machine guns, land mines and mortars, and are building increasingly sophisticated roadside bombs. Based on documents seized in the past year, Indian intelligence agencies estimate that Naxalite Inc. now has an annual budget of $250 million, much of which comes from extorting road contractors and mining companies, and from taxing hundreds of thousands of poor villagers. That money, analysts say, is funding the Maoists...
...point. Prior to the 2006 crisis, analysts warned that Iceland - where Land Rovers and private jets seem to outnumber the nation's 308,000 people - was growing too quickly, and that excessive consumption would cause the economy to overheat. Yet the nation's three largest commercial banks - Kaupthing, Landsbanki and Glitnir - continued to exploit their then strong currency and cheap credit to buy banks in Denmark, Norway and the U.K., as well as British retailers like House of Fraser and Moss Bros. They amassed foreign assets equivalent to 800% of the nation's GDP, the highest ratio of any country...