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Manipur’s perpetual turmoil and India’s act east policy: A sociological perspective
Get PDFThis paper highlights the significance of India’s Act East Policy in driving economic transformation
and development in Manipur, a state grappling with pressing challenges such as youth unemployment,
poverty, and underdevelopment—ultimately impacting its overall well-being. Blessed with favourable
resources such as human capital, bio-resources, and a geographically strategic position, Manipur offers
its access to a vast market in Southeast Asian countries. However, the state is currently gripped by
violence and frozen conflict. Since May 3, 2023, the conflict fuelled by manufactured grievances has
been allowed to persist unchecked. The weak and ineffective state response has rendered the
indiscriminate violence, untold sufferings and killing of innocent civilians serving as a grim reminder
of Manipur’s painful history of human suffering dating back to the 1950s. Given Manipur’s entrenched
sociological challenges including a legacy of political instability, civil unrest, and ethnic insurgency
violence, the weakness of the state apparatus emerges as a major impediment to fully leverage the
opportunities presented by India’s Act East Policy. Without effective governance, security, and
stability, Manipur risks being unable to harness Act East Policy’s potential for economic progress and
development
Urban Migration, Skilling, and Employment in the New Service Economy
No full textThe Skill India policy (2015) aimed to address India’s skill deficit and to connect unemployed youth to the job market. However, the research reported in this chapter revealed that most skill training programmes offer mainly short-term courses that produce insufficiently skilled workers and provide access mainly to low-wage, low-end and insecure service sector employment. While many training organisations aim to place rural youth in urban jobs as a means of poverty alleviation or economic mobility, the study showed that available service sector jobs did not provide sufficient income to sustain migrant workers in the city. The policy brief proposes several interventions, such as better designed courses leading to more sustainable employment, or a period of hand-holding after job placement enable youth to find a foothold in urban life and employment
Case for an Asset-Based Indicator of Vulnerability
No full textThis policy brief critically evaluates the conventional methods of measuring poverty in India, based on current consumption. While these estimates effectively explain current poverty, they do not capture chronic poverty or households’ ability to withstand economic shocks. An asset-based approach is more effective in capturing these aspects. Therefore, this brief advocates for using both a consumption-based measure of current poverty and an asset-based measure of vulnerability to provide a comprehensive understanding of the different dimensions of poverty
Assessing water consumption in Indian thermal power plants and parametric strategy for optimal usage: An explanatory approach using machine learning algorithms
No full textThe reliability of water supply resources is of utmost importance for the electricity sector, particularly for the cooling requirements in Steam Rankine Cycle (SRC)-based thermo-electric power plants. The study investigates the influence of specific power plant parameters, such as Cycles of Concentration (CoC) and Plant Load Factor (PLF), and meteorological conditions (such as temperature, humidity, and wind speed) on the specific water consumption (SWC) of Indian thermal power stations using Machine Learning (ML) based Decision Tree Algorithms. While regulations exist to reduce water consumption, the study highlights the underexplored potential of improving these power plant parameters, which are crucial for water use curtailment. By leveraging data-driven decision-making, the study identifies the order of importance for the significant variables that influence SWC in thermal power plants and highlights the necessity of optimizing these variables. The study concludes that an optimal operational range can be established by effectively controlling CoC and PLF, considering the local meteorological parameters, that yields minimal water consumption for power plant operations. The results derived from the Machine Learning algorithms possess intuitive validity, as confirmed by descriptive analysis and insights from domain experts, as well as previously published scholarly articles. This study is a testament to the practical effectiveness of machine learning tools in addressing socially important sustainability issues
Politicising problem wildlife: Insights from the ‘vermin’ campaign for the wild pig in Kerala, southern India
No full textManagement strategies for nuisance wildlife species are typically contentious policy decisions that reveal much about socio-political tensions in a region as they do about the depredating behaviour of wildlife. We examined human-wild pig conflict in the state of Kerala, southern India, to understand the circumstances behind the state government repeatedly petitioning the federal government for a vermin status for wild pigs. Employing a mixed methods research approach, we collected field data on wild pig crop raiding intensities, conducted stakeholder interviews, and analysed various governmental and organisational documents related to the vermin status petitions. Our results show that various human groups supported a vermin status for the wild pig for socio-political reasons rather than economic factors. Human-human conflicts over wildlife are not limited to different human groups but can also occur between state and federal governments. We recommend the need for scientific field studies before wildlife management policies are put into place to deal with problem wildlife
Spatial and temporal variations of temperature and rainfall, and land use/land cover changes in the Bengaluru urban district
Get PDFSustainable Development Goal (SDG) 11 focuses on ‘Sustainable Cities and Communities.’ This paper presents the spatial and temporal changes in rainfall and temperature from 1980 to 2022 and Land Use and Land Cover (LULC) in the Bengaluru urban district between 1992 and 2022. This study employs linear regression and non-parametric Modified Mann-Kendall techniques to evaluate the importance of weather data patterns at yearly, monthly, and seasonal levels. The findings reveal a decrease in mean maximum temperature and an increase in minimum temperature, indicating cooler days and warmer nights. Seasonal rainfall also exhibits an increasing trend in the study area over the observation period of 40 years. To quantify some of the key reasons for these microclimate changes, LULC analysis was conducted over 30 years (1992-2022). This analysis indicates a substantial transformation in Bengaluru's landscape, with built-up areas growing at the expense of water bodies, vegetation, and fallow landdue to the rapid urbanization around Bengaluru and the consequent land-use alterations without adequate planning and assessing their environmental and climate impacts. While this study is based in Bengaluru, the method used in this study can be expanded to other megacities to contribute to the achievement of SDG 11
Saving Wildlife in a Changing India
Get PDFHow can India balance economic ambitions, ecological
integrity, and social justice? This paper seeks to unpack
systemic threats to wildlife conservation, including
weakened laws, a governance favouring economics over
ecology, and a growing disconnect between policy and
on-ground action. It critiques exclusionary policies and a
growing commodification of nature, advocating for a
pluriverse of inclusive, landscape-scale conservation
approaches that integrate ecological resilience with
community leadership
