South Asia News

COLOMBO — The month of April is typically the warmest in Sri Lanka as the sun is positioned directly over the Indian Ocean island. Coupled with high humidity, the high…

Nestled within the lofty Cardamom Hills, which forms part of the Western Ghats UNESCO World Heritage Site, lies the picturesque town of Munnar in the southern Indian state of Kerala.…

Bangladesh has recorded the highest number of olive ridley turtle eggs laid on the country’s beaches this nesting season, thanks to extensive conservation actions. A survey by the NGO Nature…

KATHMANDU — Two rhino calves captured from the wild after being separated from their mothers in recent years have been released back into nature by Nepali officials. The greater one-horned…

One of Bangladesh’s two Ramsar sites, wetlands of international importance, is slowly losing some of the waterbirds that seek respite at this key migratory pit stop, a new study says.…

KATHMANDU — Until a few months ago, residents of Geruwa, a rural municipality in western Nepal, used to rush to their homes before dusk and shut themselves indoors. That was…

On April 4, a large fire gutted thousands of shops at a popular clothing market named Banga Bazar in the Bangladeshi capital, Dhaka. Firefighters complained of water scarcity as a…

KATHMANDU — As the crowing of a rooster signals the break of dawn in Taplejung in eastern Nepal, two men grab their slingshots and head out to work. They know…

 COLOMBO — On average one elephant has died each day in Sri Lanka in the first three months of this year, with nearly half of those deaths due to human…

COLOMBO — The Sri Lankan government is filing a lawsuit in Singapore for compensation nearly two years since the worst maritime disaster in the country’s history. But activists say it…

COLOMBO — Sri Lanka’s animal-human conflicts are on the rise with increasing crop raids, but a recent request from a Chinese company requesting 100,00 toque macaques from Sri Lanka has…

Bangladesh has been swept up in the massive heat wave scorching large parts of Asia, with temperatures among the highest in six decades. The country’s capital, Dhaka, saw the temperature…

Authorities investigating the discovery of 14 dead vultures in a feeding zone that’s meant to be safe for the scavenging birds have found that they died from eating poisoned bait…

KATHMANDU — Tulshi Laxmi Suwal, a Nepali conservationist, has been named one of the seven winners of this year’s prestigious Whitley Awards, known as the “Green Oscars,” in recognition of…

CHITWAN, Nepal — Wild male elephants in search of females to mate with are homing in on captive domestic elephants, in the process posing a threat to human settlements and…

One of the deadliest snakes on the Indian subcontinent is growing increasingly common in Bangladesh, spurring questions about the country’s preparedness to deal with venomous snakes in general. Russell's viper…

On Jan. 21, as a landlord in Bangladesh's northern district of Panchagarh was getting a pond dug, clearing a bamboo bush with a excavator, two orange snakes came slithering out…

ANURADHAPURA, Sri Lanka — Current climate models forewarn that Sri Lanka’s dry zone is likely to become drier due to climate change, resulting in water shortages for agriculture. A country…

KATHMANDU — Nepal hasn’t had an environment minister since October last year — a vacuum that could be either good or bad, depending on how one looks at it. The…

KATHMANDU — The spring season in the Northern Hemisphere is a critical time for red pandas, particularly in Nepal. This is the period when these furry, tree-dwelling animals spend a…

KATHMANDU — On an early spring afternoon on the fringes of Nepal’s Chitwan National Park, smoke fills the air and the smell of burning grass is overpowering. As flames rage…

KATHMANDU — News of four cheetah cubs being born recently in India has sparked interest in the species in the conservation community in neighboring Nepal, where the big cat’s historical…

Salinity intrusion triggered by different factors, including sea-level rise, commercial shrimp cultivation and a decrease in water flow from transboundary rivers upstream, has directly affected agriculture in the southern coastal…

COLOMBO — The Sinharaja Biosphere Reserve and UNESCO World Heritage Site is a large complex of lowland wilderness that is largely fragmented due to human activity. Walankanda and Viharakanda are…

KATHMANDU — In 2012, when wildlife biologist Kanchan Thapa visited Chitwan National Park, a stronghold of the Bengal tiger in Nepal, a colleague asked him a question: “How much carbon…

Mr. Sobhan, a wealthy retired lawyer, decides he wants to do something to improve society. Realizing that the new aquaculture revolution has driven out local fish species, he compiles a…

KATHMANDU — The B.P. Koirala Memorial Cancer Hospital in Nepal’s central Bharatpur city, Chitwan District, bustles as patients, most of them from the country’s northern hilly areas, line up for…

CHITWAN — The chirping of birds is interrupted by the rustling of leaves and the sound of breaking twigs. It’s breakfast time at the office of the National Trust for…

COLOMBO — Arjuna Jinadasa owns a plot of land full of coconut trees in Kurunegala, in northwestern Sri Lanka, where he enjoys a good produce of about 3,000 coconuts a…

DHAKA – Bangladesh has recently achieved remarkable success in freshwater fish production due to its fast-growing aquaculture, securing third place in global freshwater fish farming. The country produced more than…