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Charting a new course for the oceans- Preface to the Special Section on "Sustainable ocean technologies"
Get PDFWhat is the role of oceans in shaping our future and
ensuring sustainability of the planet Earth? We know that
life originated in the ocean almost three billion years
earlier than on land which means that oceans make the
planet Earth habitable. We need to focus our attention on
‘oceans’ as they control weather, climate and hazards,
provide us energy, food and mineral resources as well as
an ecosystem to survive
A Multidisciplinary Framework for Sustainable Water Resources Management-A Case Study of the Almatti-Pennar ILR Scheme
No full textIn India, rainfall is predominantly restricted to the monsoon season which
results in uneven water availability and distribution across the country
frequently creating a situation where some regions experience a drought
while others are suffering from floods at the same time. Extreme climatic
events also give rise to the demand for proper and sustainable water
storage structures and river management. Moreover, the freshwater
requirement for irrigation in many agrarian states is also extraordinarily
high (78 percent of the available surface water) resulting in the inefficient
utilization of water in India’s agricultural sector. In India, this scarcity is
expected to grow in the coming decades since the population of India is
expected to increase to 1518 million in 2036(Bandyopadhyay et al., 2003;
CWC, 2019a;NCP, 2019). . The districts of Raichur and Ballari are located
in the Hyderabad-Karnataka (H-K) region which is the second-largest arid
region in India despite being drained by the Krishna river and its
tributaries. The Nanjundappa committee had identified the H-K region as
the most backward region in Karnataka. As per the 2011 census, only 50
percent of the rural households in Raichur district and 71 percent of the
rural households in the Ballari district had access to drinking water
through taps (Census of India, 2014a,b,c). However, no research has
been carried out to estimate the medium and long-term water supply &
demand in the “dry” agro-climatic zone of Karnataka (Ballari & Raichur
districts) and the “scarce-rainfall” agro-climatic zone of Andhra Pradesh
(Anantapur district). In view of the existing inter-state agreements to share
the water in the Krishna basin in partial exchange for the Godavari water
flowing into the Krishna river after the completion of the Polavaram
project, there is a need for research on Inter-Linking River (ILR) projects
which can alleviate the water stress in the dry/scarce-rainfall zones of
Karnataka & Andhra Pradesh (Ref).The present investigation provides a
comprehensive assessment of the Almatti-Pennar (A-P) link as a means
to alleviate the drinking water crisis in Ballari and Raichur districts of
Karnataka as well the Anantapur district in Andhra Pradesh. Using the
plans forthe inter-basin transfer of 1980 Million Cubic Meters (MCM) of
water from the Almatti Dam on the Krishna river to the Pennar basin, the
present study provides a background study ofthe routing of the waters proposed by the National Water Development Authority (NWDA) in their
Feasibility report (FR). The FRhighlights the immense potential for
exploring alternative routes and optimization techniques with the objective
of maximizing its contribution to the water-stressed districts of Anantapur,
Ballari, and Raichur while minimizing any environmental and social
impacts. This will facilitate the achievement of Sustainable Development
Goal (SDG) 6 (i.e., Ensure availability and sustainable management of
water and sanitation for all) which, in turn, isconnected with several other
SDGs
Deras Beyond Caste: Remedies for Developmental Pressures
No full textIn the northern regions of India, the rising popularity of alternative religious sects, prominently Deras, has sparked much interest in explaining this phenomenon. Current literature, based on case studies of specific Dalit Deras, relates the emergence of these religious sects to caste-based social discrimination and exclusion of lower castes by the mainstream Sikh religion. This article presents a case study of a small town, Patran, in the state of Punjab. Confirming the popularity of these alternative religious sects for upper and lower castes in the town, the article argues that the contemporary attractiveness of Deras needs to be understood also as a result of localised agrarian dynamics and related social pressures engendered by the process of rural to urban and agrarian to non-agrarian transition
Rethinking UNESCO World Heritage Conservation-Management: Negotiations with Everyday Heritage Governance at Hampi, India
No full textI commenced the study from the vantage of community-engaged practice seeking to understand if dissonance was inevitable when trajectories of heritage intersected with peoples’ lives. I proposed to observe the nature of interactions between different actors (experts, enthusiasts, officials, resident communities) at Hampi World Heritage Site, India over routine site conservation-management and address the questions: what are the positions of resident communities about the cultural heritage site in their midst that has impacted or will impact their lives at some point? Do they value the cultural heritage site? How do they value it? If not, what do they value? Following deep immersion in the field (over 16 months) I recognized the simplistic nature of the framing above. Fieldwork and analyses shaped the study as a heritage ethnography that problematises the everyday consequences of heritage and its conservation as material practice. Through the thesis I trace how heritage governs place Hampi, including its resident communities, rather than the site’s official heritage ascription being in need of participatory governance that is enabled by community engagement and local development. I then foreground both the nature of and negotiations with the everyday heritage regime instituted on site, subsequent to its designation as UNESCO World Heritage Site, along with its mechanisms of governance by addressing the questions: What does the everyday form of the regime look like? Who does the governing? Who is being governed and how? What are its consequences and finally, what is the role of practice in such governance. I argue that the regime is a bureaucracy of care (not of apathy as popularly supposed) that spatially governs place Hampi through the mechanism of nationalism, and its resident communities (social governance) through the mechanism of developmental-ism. I further argue that it is care that proves to be alienating for resident communities, resulting in different forms of displacement. I simultaneously foreground the (unintended) role of customary conservation mechanisms in enabling the regime, whose consequences are contrary to the aims of a largely ethical, reflexive practice, namely, democratising processes of heritage conservation-management. By presenting a grounded understanding of the dynamics of heritage practice and its consequences, through a heritage agnostic approach, l aim to push the boundaries of critical conservation studies
Duality in science
Get PDFScientific concepts are unique in the way they accrue multiple meanings. This feature will be illustrated through the powerful concept of duality in science. We discuss the multiple meanings of this concept in different domains of science and analyse the duality relations found in them. The relationship between duality and symmetry, as well as with the notion of completeness, is explored to understand the many uses of the concept of duality
Optimal Electricity Mix for the Southern Region: Summary Report of NIAS – MOES Workshop 17th January 2020 (NIAS/NSE/EEP/U/WR/07/2020)
Get PDFA one-day workshop was organized on January 17, 2020 at the National Institute of Advanced Studies (NIAS) on the theme, “Optimal Electricity Mix for the Southern Region.” Results of studies undertaken by the Energy and Environment Program at NIAS were presented at the workshop to get feedback and inputs from experts and practitioners in the power sector regarding the theme. The presentations in the workshop included the current overall situation of the power sector, the challenges in renewable energy integration, and ongoing interventions and modeling efforts to better manage a diverse and large Indian power system, with a specific focus on the southern region in India. The overall aim of the workshop was to arrive at a set of suggestions as well as research directions to address the question of economic burdens on increasingly stressed distribution companies in the country as well as to make the best use of available resources in an environmentally sustainable manner. The range of topics covered during the workshop included, generation expansion planning for India, evaluating the financial implications of emissions reductions in the southern region, optimal thermal energy use to compliment increased infirm power supply in the grid, regulatory and infrastructural challenges to renewable energy integration, developments in clean coal technology with a focus on coal gasification, and strategies for ensuring cost-effective environmental sustainability in the coal and lignite fired power plants. This report contains a summary of the deliberations and the key recommendations that are worthy of consideration by policy makers to transition towards an optimal energy mix for the southern region. Similar studies are being undertaken by NIAS for the overall electricity sector in the entire country
Doctoral Journeys: From Field Diaries to Institutional (ised) Authorship
Get PDFThe ways in which three doctoral scholars engaged in
ethnographic research in differing social worlds are
explored here. Accounting for the ethical–political
dilemmas engendered by “fieldwork” and the ways in
which we grappled with them, this paper reflects upon
methodology and questions of power pertaining to
disciplinary boundaries, social identities, and
researcher–practitioner binaries that have marked key
debates within scholarship on the Indian social. This
reflection draws from our vantage point as doctoral
students, particularly addressing our preparedness for
the messiness of field participation and converting field
notes into authorial accounts. The arguments in the
paper feed into larger conversations around
representation in the social sciences. By foregrounding
our ethical–moral positions and the institutional spaces
(or the lack thereof) to act upon such imperatives, the
paper raises important questions about the dilemmas of
authoring social worlds