Malika is now the head of the Village Forest Council in the village of Sarmoli. She is also a founding member of Maati, a women’s collective in Munsiari. Malika advocates subsistence farming as a way of life, and views the welfare of local people as being jeopardized by the intrusion of market forces into Munsiari. She thinks that one such intrusion is the government’s plans to construct eight dams on the nearby Gori river. When tunnels are dug in the mountains to divert water for the construction of these dams, it destabilizes the mountain slopes leading to increasing landslides and loss of forest. This year, Majuli was hit by one of the worst floods in recent years. The flood was caused by the breach of an embankment in Matmora, which channels the entire water of the Brahmaputra into the Luit River. 
This year several chapters of AID, including the Princeton, the Boston and the Maryland chapters, organized marathon programs as an effort to raise funds for supporting grassroots level initiatives in India. Running a full or a half marathon is a herculean task, especially for many of those who have never run more than 2 miles in his/her life. AID anti-corruption team (ACT) believes in the power of information in fighting social injustice. The malaise of corruption has seeped through every pore of India's socioeconomic, political and bureaucratic fabric so much that the Indian citizenry had started accepting it as a way of life! Recently approved projects November 2008 in AID TMIA pdf file Editors Amrita Balachandran, Subhrajit Bhattacharya Volume 14, Issue 7 |
