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Past research on domestic violence in India recurrently highlight women's economic empowerment as a major deterrent to domestic violence. That said, this paper tries to understand what is the nature of relationship between women's empowerment and their experience of spousal violence? In doing so, it specifically explores how this relationship is interceded by regional specificities. Based on an analysis of the National Family Health Survey (NFHS)-5 data in India, this paper observes that the relationship between women's empowerment and domestic violence is contentious. However, women having some education and using mobile phones are less vulnerable. Hence, this study concludes that mobile phones and Internet-based applications as well as community-based interventions could be the effective measures to end domestic violence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper is an overall assessment of the security situation in Afghanistan that includes both traditional and non-traditional aspects. The paper highlights the deteriorating internal security that is bolstering Pashtunisation in Afghanistan and causing the forced displacement of non-Pashtuns. The implication of this grim development in India's neighbourhood has severely impacted the peace and security of the Central Asian Region, Russia, China, Iran, India and Pakistan. The victory of the Taliban has resuscitated myriad terrorist groups who want to establish Islamic Caliphate in neighbouring countries, therefore leading to the gradual Talibanisation of the Asian region. The paper also delves into how the departure of foreign forces has created a power vacuum in Afghanistan that has led to the revival of a New Great Game with the addition of regional actors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Based upon research in the state of Bihar, India, this article argues that informal access to medicines in Northern India is a core element of the government of healthcare. Informal providers such as unlicensed village doctors and unlicensed drug sellers play a major role in access to medicines in Bihar, in the particular context of the dismantling of public procurement services. Building on recent works in the socio-anthropology of pharmaceuticals, the article shows the importance of taking into account the political economy of drugs in India, in order to understand local problems of access more fully. If informal providers occupy such an important position in the government of healthcare in India, this is partly due to the shaping of healthcare as access to drugs on health markets. Elaborating the argument from interviews with health professionals and patients, the article first shows the situation of public healthcare and public procurement in Bihar; then it presents the role of informal medicine providers; lastly, it shows how patients deal with the fact that they live in a ‘pharmaceutical world’ where access to health equates with access to medicines. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Several studies have found restrictions on minority faith-based communities to be related to the onset of violent religious hostilities. Absent from this work, though, is a consideration of the fact that minority religious discrimination can take different forms, and, consequently, may encourage violence in different ways. This paper seeks to fill this void by examining different forms of minority religious restrictions and their relationship to religious violence. Specifically, we analyze the comparative strength of three basic types of religious discrimination—restrictions on minority religious practices, restrictions on minority religious institutions, and restrictions on conversion and proselytizing —on violence carried out by both religious majority groups and religious minority groups. Interestingly, our analysis shows all three forms of restrictions encourage violence from religious majorities, but not from minorities. We supplement the statistical analysis with a case study of faith-based discrimination and violent religious hostilities in India. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The commercial surrogacy industry in India administers in a way where the women working as surrogate mothers live in surrogate houses. It is a space deliberately designed and run by either the fertility clinics or a third-party agency, where the surrogate mothers are required to stay for the entire gestation period. The surrogacy industry in India utilizes the vulnerability of couples who do not or cannot have children, in order to prepare valuable and docile bodies which can serve as a platform for accumulation of wealth. This paper draws from an ethnographic inquiry of the surrogate housing facilities functioning in two cities in India: Anand and Bengaluru. The paper will argue that the surrogacy industry in India produces geographies of carceral domesticity by deploying disciplining apparatuses governing the day-to-day mundane activities of the reproductive laborers. The medical experts often resort to the narrative that these women cannot be trusted with the safety of the babies they carry, hence, justifying their confinement in the surrogate house. Further, the possibility that the surrogate mothers may develop emotional attachments to the babies they carry, which in turn, will endanger the surrogacy arrangements, also runs through such narratives of regulation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the context of the developed economies, recent political economy scholarship has highlighted the growing role of intangible assets (brand equity, software, business processes, patents etc.) in corporate portfolios. Much of this literature has emphasized how intangible assets erect barriers to entry, produce artificial scarcity of key inputs, enhance the pricing power of firms and thus lead to greater and greater levels of concentration. Being as they are monopoly rights and privileges, intangible assets represent the relational power of their owner vis-à-vis those excluded from their ownership. While much of this literature has focused on the developed world, this paper turns its gaze to the case of a developing country and analyzes the patterns and trends of intangible assets for a sample of Indian firms for the period 2000–2022. The analysis reveals a substantial acceleration in the weight of net intangible assets relative to net physical assets, especially after 2008. It also suggests that the largest and most powerful corporations are the ones that have contributed to this spike. Ranked by assets, sales and ownership category, the results show that intangible asset accumulation has been the strongest in the highest echelons of the corporate hierarchy. Moreover, the patterns of intangible asset accumulation have been such that they have not been restricted to the traditional "rentier" sectors in the sense that their presence in the "productive" sectors has been as important if not more so. By focusing on firm-level patterns of intangible asset accumulation, the results show the internal and necessary connections between accumulation and value capture that undergirds modern day capitalism in the Southern peripheries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sexual health education among adolescents with intellectual disabilities is an area of concern among parents and educators. Special educators play a vital role in teaching sexual health and safety to their students with disabilities. The present study explores special educators' concerns in teaching sexual health among adolescents with intellectual disabilities. The participants included 35 special educators working with adolescents with intellectual disabilities in India. Summative content analysis of the data collected using a semi-structured interview schedule highlights the neglect of the issues related to sexual health among adolescents with disabilities. Special educators reported the challenges in providing sexual health education. Teachers lacked skills in imparting sexual health education. Developmentally and culturally appropriate sexual health education can help adolescents with a disability learn healthy life skills. The paper emphasizes the need for professional support and training among special educators on sexual health education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Unpacking the linkages between mainstream education and private tutoring is fundamental for advancing knowledge on tutoring's implications for learners and systems of learning. This paper explores the micro-processes of teaching-learning at schools and tutoring centres to provide a nuanced understanding of the dynamics between them, in the context of India. Using qualitative data from lesson observations, interviews and focus group discussions with 85 participants, the paper explicates the teaching-learning processes in these two settings. The findings and analysis illuminate how actors in one setting shape their responses based on their perceptions of the other, thus influencing their pedagogical practices. The cyclic nature of the resulting dynamics highlights the negative implications for mainstream education in terms of undermining the implementation of progressive pedagogical reforms and inhibiting the need for systemic interventions to resolve incongruities and misalignments within the larger education system. This could result in a potentially vicious feedback loop. The non-binary exploration of this feedback loop has wider global relevance in terms of the nuances added to the theme of private tutoring's negative outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Infrastructure-making in interwar India was a dynamic, multilayered process involving roads and vehicles in urban and rural sites. One of their strongest playgrounds was Bombay Presidency and the Central Provinces in central and western India. Focusing on this region in the interwar period, this paper analyzes the varied relationship between peasant households and town-centred modernizing agents in the making of road transport infrastructures. The central argument of this paper is about the persistence of bullock carts over motor cars in the region. This persistence was grounded in the specific regional environment, the effects of the 1930s economic depression, and the priorities of social classes. Pinpointing these connections, the paper highlights that "modernization" of infrastructure was not a simple, linear process of progressivist change, nor did it mean the survival of apparently "old" technologies in the modern era. Instead, the paper pays attention to conflicting social complexities, implications, and meanings of the connection between infrastructure and modernity that modernization assumptions often overlook. Here, the paper shows how technological change occurred as a result of real, material class interests pulling infrastructural technology in different directions. This was where and why arguments of road-motor lobbyists and cart advocates eventually clashed, and Gandhian social workers resisted motor transport in defense of peasant interests. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

If the entanglements of real estate and finance capital are pivotal in ongoing urban transformations in cities of the global south, then a less visible but equally vital dimension is the process of land assembly on which residential and commercial real estate speculation and development are premised. This paper pries open the value chain of land assembly that underlies these transformations in a rapidly expanding peri-urban frontier of Bengaluru, India. Drawing on detailed interviews with land market intermediaries, operating across different scales, who were instrumental in assembling agricultural land for a large apartment complex, the paper shows how existing forms of social power and local knowledge are harnessed to create inter-scalar linkages that enable the creation and extraction of value in Indian real estate. It makes the case for understanding the economic and cultural work of intermediaries in animating land's value chain as 'articulation work'. Finally, the paper assesses the varying forms and quantum of value that are generated and captured by different actors in the value chain, which stretches from the landowning farmer up to a major real estate company, to reflect on the micro-dynamics of speculative urbanism and agrarian urbanization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Youth suicide is a significant public health problem in Low-and middle-income countries (LMIC), including India. It is a distinct phenomenon with various bio-psycho-social determinants. Despite this, comprehensive literature on this topic is lacking from India. Thus, the current paper aimed to review the available literature on youth-suicide from India and other LMIC, discusses the contentious issues, including potential solutions for the possible roadblocks, and provides recommendations for the national suicide-prevention policy and strategy (NSPPS) in the Indian context. We found that the magnitude of youth suicide in India is substantial with the distinct bio-psycho-social determinants. Although, youth-specific suicide prevention and therapeutic intervention do exist; its feasibility and effectivity in the Indian context are yet to be established. The is an urgent need for the NSPPS; experiences from other LMIC should be incorporated while framing such policies. More research is required from India in this area. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Autism is called "spectrum" disorder because there is a wide variation in the type and the severity of symptoms that people experience. India has a vast population, diverse cultures, and multiple languages, making it crucial to under- stand the unique challenges faced by individuals with autism spectrum disorder in the Indian context. This narrative review explores the current state of knowledge about autism spectrum disorder in the Indian context. Databases such as PubMed, Google Scholar, Sage journals, and other sources were searched with relevant terms for preparing this review. All published literature till January 2023 was studied and those which met the inclusion criteria were included. The resources included were original research articles, review articles, web pages, and book chapters addressing the purpose of the paper. Forty-eight such studies which met the inclusion criteria were included in the study. Results showed that the prevalence of autism varied across different studies in India. The study found advanced paternal age, fetal distress, gestational respiratory infections, labor complications, preterm birth, neonatal jaundice, delayed birth cry, birth asphyxia, late initiation of breastfeeding, neonatal seizures, use of maternal hormonal intervention, and consanguinity as some of the identified risk factors of autism spectrum disorder. Parents and families of children with autism have to go through a complex negative experience, both in the family and the community. This negative experience is further compounded by the lack of awareness and access to appropriate professional help and resources. It can be concluded that there is an urgent need for services that help parents cope with the stress of parenting a child with autism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Scholarly work that seeks to theorize about fragmentation of media audiences has largely been restricted to the experiences of advanced democracies in the west. This has resulted in a preponderance of research endeavors that have sought to understand this phenomenon through ideas that are pertinent, perhaps solely to those contexts, and not as applicable outside, particularly in the Global South. This has potentially limited our imagination into various other ways in which audience fragmentation can manifest in these often-overlooked countries. In this paper, I use the case of online India as an example to offer a theoretical framework – that of news reading publics – for understanding audience fragmentation as a more global socio-political phenomenon that allows for rigorous comparative research, without being restrictive in scope. I draw from existing theories in communication and related disciplines and show how such a framework can be situated within existing social science theory. I argue that this framework should make us think of audience fragmentation in western contexts to be special cases of a more general model. I also show how network analysis can be used as a context-agnostic tool for identifying news reading publics and demonstrate the utility of such a method in complementing this theoretical framework. Finally, I discuss potential future research directions that this framework generates. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Mental health issues are common among college students, and structured services have been proven to enhance outcomes. Despite increased enrolment for higher education in India, college mental health services remain sparse. JEEVANI is the first structured state-wide college mental health service in India. This paper describes its framework and provides an overview of its functioning during the initial five months. Methods: In 2019–2020, the Directorate of Collegiate Education, Government of Kerala, implemented the program in 66 colleges catering to approximately 60,000 students. Qualified counsellors were trained to identify issues and provide interventions and early referrals, using a stepped-care approach. They conducted awareness programs to promote mental health and reduce stigma. Results: The services were accessed by 2,315 students during the assessment period (October 2019 to February 2020). The beneficiaries were predominantly females (54.1%). Over a third (38.8%) belonged to the lower socio-economic strata, and 2.5% had significant vulnerabilities. Although no syndromal diagnoses were made, anxiety and depression were the most common presentations. The counsellors provided 3,758 individual sessions and facilitated support for students who reported academic difficulties or interpersonal issues. Severe mental illness was detected in 54 students, and referrals for specialist mental health input were initiated in 68. Conclusion: Describing the framework, sharing the technical material, and providing an overview of its functioning from a resource-constrained setting in India may encourage higher education institutions in low- and middle-income countries to consider similar projects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

What did science make possible for colonial rule? How was science in turn marked by the knowledge and practices of those under colonial rule? Here I approach these questions via the social history of Madras Observatory. Constructed in 1791 by the East India Company, the observatory was to provide local time to mariners and served as a clearinghouse for the company's survey and revenue administration. The astronomical work of Madras' Brahmin assistants relied upon their knowledge of jyotiśāstra [Sanskrit astronomy/astrology], and can be seen as a specialized form of the kind of South Indian scribal labor and knowledge that also staffed the company's tax offices. If at Greenwich the division of labor meant observatory work bore resemblances to the factory and the accounts office, in Madras, astronomy and accounting drew on similar labor forms because they were part of the same enterprise. But the company did not just adapt preexisting forms of labor, it also attempted to produce its own at a school built near the observatory to train "half-caste" orphans as apprentice surveyors and assistant computers. The school, staffed by the Brahmins, drew upon knowledge and pedagogical practice associated with the tinnai, the schools in which upper-caste children learned to read, write, and calculate. For a time, the observatory's social order was literally "half-caste." The paper also considers how the relationship between caste, status, and instrument was reflected in the visual and material culture of the observatory, such as in Indian-language inscriptions on its central pillar. For company astronomers, the measurement of time meant reworking the relationships among the Indian past, the colonial present, and an imperial posterity. Science under colonial rule spanned multiple temporal and social registers because it was the result of negotiations between the demands of political economy and the knowledge and practices of colonized others. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Fictional narratives on Chennai, after its official conversion from Madras in 1996, offer an intriguing register for exploring ways of belonging. Using a postcolonial framework, the paper closely scrutinizes T. S. Tirumurti's Clive Avenue and Chennaivaasi (and some other authors invested in Chennai's contemporary culture) and subjects them to critique as sites of meaning making. An effort is made to explore how these narratives respond to the new reality of Chennai, to what extent they see the city producing a standardized experience, and how the fictional characters corroborate or contest institutional change. In the process, the texts are brought to converse with the postcolonial desire for cultural autonomy, its mediation by a nativist agenda, as well as the ambivalence and contradictions inherent in such a desire. The texts betray the inadequacies of the new name as a stable container of cultural meanings and propose an idea of the city that is internally incoherent and multi-experiential. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sports and Crime are an integral part of the social reality of India. The recent case of Olympic medalist Sushil Kumar has again reinvigorated the public sentiments regarding the relationship between crime and the state of 'minor' sports in the country. This paper analyses the issue through an intersectional paradigm informed by the neo-Marxist analysis of sports and Classical Marxist Criminology. The paper argues that sports and crime are integrally related to each other in the rural hinterlands of India. This relationship is expressed in the processes in which sportspersons attempt to adapt to varying circumstances. Under neoliberal capitalism, where the dominant ideology proposes to normalise the idea of succeeding at all costs, sportspersons associated with 'minor' sports in India often resort to criminality because of their lack of social capital coupled with the faults associated with the process of management of these sports. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Indian women are fast moving from conventional jobs to night-shift jobs in transnational call centers. Women working at night is a relatively new phenomenon and stands apart from the usual Indian lifestyle. Night work and the dual burden of work and family have adverse implications on women employees' physical and psychological health. The paper highlights the occupational health hazards of women employees of international call centers through a systematic review of 38 articles published between 2000 and 2018. Data and evidence from studies on women employees of international call centers in India reveal that odd working hours against the biological clock make women employees suffer from several health problems. Women were more prone to health problems as compared to their counterparts. The responsibility of balancing work and family leads to high levels of stress. Despite the attractive salary package, most women employees suffer health hazards and psychological disorders. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract Quotas have helped women achieve greater numerical representation in government around the world. Yet do they have indirect effects on representation elsewhere? We take advantage of plausibly exogenous variation in when and which states enacted legislation mandating 50% women's representation in the lowest level of government in India to analyze how quotas affect women's candidacy, vote share, and winning probability at the state level of government. We find that women are more likely to compete and win for the higher political office when women reservation is implemented at the local levels of political governance. This suggests that gender quotas have spillover effects onto other levels in politics. As women continue to be under-represented in politics, this paper highlights the role of policy instruments in shaping political careers for women and building inclusive political institutions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: In India, mental health rehabilitation centers run income generation programs (IGP) for therapeutic engagement, skills training, and income generation of clients. The centers have evolved IGP models relevant to their settings. There is a paucity of published literature on practices employed by the centers. Methods: This paper compiles data gathered from visits to 13 centers between November 2018 and April 2019. Information was collected through observation and interviews with staff involved in IGP, using a semi-structured pro forma designed for study. Results: Most centers were based in south India (n = 11) and urban areas (n = 12). Each center ran two to seven IGP. Each center involved 20–50 clients in IGP. Clients involved in IGP were aged 20–60 years. The centers ran a range of IGP, including the manufacturing of household consumables, paper products, textile products, handicraft products, food products, and jute products; animal husbandry and horticulture initiatives; and running cafeterias and petty shops. IGP were mostly selected based on market demand and sales value of products (n = 11); ease of doing (n = 5); interests, abilities, exposure, and experience of clients (n = 5); and availability of resources (n = 3). Products were priced primarily to cover input and labor costs (n = 8), and many centers sold products below the market rates (n = 5). Running stalls during public events was a common strategy for the sale of products (n = 9). Personal contacts and "word of mouth" publicity were used for advertisement (n = 6). Four centers involved family members in IGP. Conclusion: The nature of IGP varied in terms of setting, available resources, and profile of clients availing the services. Marketing and sales were a challenge. A supportive framework of policies and schemes is essential to promote IGP at mental health rehabilitation centers. This report may be helpful for professionals and centers planning to set up an IGP. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Indian women are fast moving from conventional jobs to night-shift jobs in transnational call centers. Women working at night is a relatively new phenomenon and stands apart from the usual Indian lifestyle. Night work and the dual burden of work and family have adverse implications on women employees' physical and psychological health. The paper highlights the occupational health hazards of women employees of international call centers through a systematic review of 38 articles published between 2000 and 2018. Data and evidence from studies on women employees of international call centers in India reveal that odd working hours against the biological clock make women employees suffer from several health problems. Women were more prone to health problems as compared to their counterparts. The responsibility of balancing work and family leads to high levels of stress. Despite the attractive salary package, most women employees suffer health hazards and psychological disorders. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper investigates the determinants of remittances received by Indian households after considering the number of migrants as endogenous in the remittance decision. For this purpose, the paper uses the two rounds of India Human Development Survey conducted in the year 2004–2005 and 2011–2012. To account for the endogeneity of the number of migrants, the paper estimates the Two-Stage Residual Inclusion model. Here, initially the number of migrants are modelled using the negative binomial regression and then the residuals from this regression along with the original explanatory variables are included in the second-stage regression for the remittances. The results show that the number of migrants is endogenous and positively affects the total remittances received by the urban households. However, for rural households, there is no relation between the number of migrants and remittances. The findings also indicate the presence of altruism behind remittances for both rural and urban households. Along with this, some evidence of inheritance and insurance motives is also observed for rural and urban households, respectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the intersection of group-based expressions including digital moral outrage, collective guilt, and collective action on Twitter, following the tragic incident of 8 May 2020, in which 16 migrant workers were run over by a train after the Indian government imposed a sudden COVID-19-related lockdown. Twitter data were gathered immediately at three different times - May 8–15, May 16- 23, May 24-May 31, and 4598 tweets were manually coded. The analysis revealed that digital moral outrage was the most frequently expressed emotion. It, however, gradually decreased, signaling digital outrage fatigue. Collective guilt and sympathy constituted the second-largest portion of the total tweets, and tweets reflecting collective action by the community progressively increased. The network of relationships among different group-based emotions, the promotion of one-sided narratives and virtue signaling on social media platforms are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the effects of WhatsApp as a mode of dissemination of political posters. It found that platform affordances that control the crafting and dissemination of political messages open up the possibility of vague political messaging by conforming to the social media's visual culture and limit the spread of these messages, restricting the ability to organically gather support for a political cause. Despite the growing appeal of social media in political campaigns, social media messages when used by individuals and small, independent social media groups, who are not a part of a larger, organized political party or movement, have little influence on electoral decisions of voters about a political cause that faces weak public support. This was discussed in the context of electoral results of the Leftist political party in India in 2019 national elections. The paper then contributes to our understanding of the extent of the influence of social media platforms on political media messages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Children with systemic lupus erythematosus have a more challenging and difficult course as compared to their adult counterparts. Today, the aim of therapy for any child with lupus is to keep the child in a state of sustained remission with minimal or no use of steroids. This laudable goal is often difficult to achieve for the child with lupus. In addition to the use of disease modifying agents, sometimes in combination, Rituximab (RTX) is also used as an off-label indication to manage such patients. Objectives: To study the use, efficacy and safety of RTX in a cohort of patients with pediatric lupus followed at a single tertiary level center in Northern India. Methods: This paper is a retrospective review looking at the use of RTX in children with systemic lupus at a tertiary level pediatric rheumatology center in North India over a period of seventeen years. This paper describes the indications, use, efficacy and safety of RTX in childhood systemic lupus erythematosus. Results: RTX was used in 17 of 225 pediatric lupus patients (7.5%), with the most common indication being resistant renal disease (53%). Significant improvement was seen in all domains studied: The mean SLEDAI was 16.25 prior to RTX and reduced to 1.43 six months after the RTX (p value 0.001), steroid use dropped from 100% pre- RTX to 33% at 2 years, there was a sustained reduction in proteinuria in the patients with nephritis from a mean urine spot protein creatinine ratio of 3.1 pre RTX to 0.4 at one year post RTX (p=.006). Finally, 82% of the children had no flare during the follow up (median 24 months). No patient had any adverse event. Conclusions: This study confirms that RTX is very effective in childhood lupus and can be safely used even in a country with a very high burden of infectious diseases. This data adds to the scarce literature in this area from the developing world. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Global clinical trials depend on a range of standards in order for research results to be comparable. As standardization is more than a mere technical exercise, tensions can arise when things are not uniform. This paper uses empirical data from interviews with principal investigators as well as Clinical Research Organization and pharmaceutical industry representatives working in India's clinical trial industry to critically examine the ways Indian researchers navigate quests for standardization. It turns the analytical lens to the often obfuscated work of standardization aiming to transcend the biological and cultural specificity of research participants and research sites. Drawing on the concept of local biologies, it illustrates that the universal body presumed by clinical trial methodology is, in fact, a specifically Euro-American one: Indian participants not only need to be made globally comparable but also aligned with the drugs' future consumers. Focusing on the tensions between biomedicine's postulation of bodily universality and trial participants' local biologies, this paper advances recent interventions problematizing the structural violence undergirding global clinical trials. It also contributes to the literature on local biologies in its discussion of how these are negotiated in Indian for-profit clinical trials. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA), 2019, in India was widely contested by both political parties and various civil society formations. Shaheen Bagh, a sit-in protest demonstration which continued for over a hundred days in the nation's capital from mid-December 2019 to late March 2020, occupied the central position within the corpus of these protest demonstrations. The protests at Shaheen Bagh were led by poor, Muslim working-class women, who had come out on the streets protesting and asserting their rights amidst the dominant ruling-class communal politics. The Shaheen Bagh protests were a potent force of the working-class and oppressed minorities of the country. The paper brings in Marxist and Gramscian perspectives to explain how Shaheen Bagh has contributed to Indian left-wing politics. The paper argues that the women in Shaheen Bagh have been successful in bridging the gap between the civil society and political society in the country and has to an extent, altered the very nature of Indian politics. Moreover, the assertive nature of the Muslim women regarding their religion and the support which they garnered from the Indian left, widely accused by many of being Islamophobic in nature, has wide repercussions as far as political and social alliances between the left and Muslim politics in India is concerned. The present paper locates the protest within the notion of subaltern unity and tries to analyse the possible impacts of the support for the protests, within and beyond the anti-CAA protest movement, from the Indian left. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The mobility turn offers a rich terrain for research to investigate the exercise of politics and power in movement through attention to associated meanings and practices. Despite this, the ontologies that can anchor this research within a historical imagination remains largely uncharted. Happily for us, coming from the opposite direction history, and especially the field of transport history, has grappled with mobilizing history in the face of the mobility turn. Several scholars have offered "usable past" as a mode of mobilizing mobility cultures of the past to inform policy actors about future choices. But is the ontology of a usable past appropriate for countries enmeshed within pre/post/colonial histories of displacement in their society and culture? Employing a case of automobilization in the city of Bengaluru in India, this paper sketches an exposition of the "displaced past" in sedimented residues that continues to live and contest the enterprise of automobility. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper describes the intervention strategy to improve water security in Sultanpur, a village in periurban Gurgaon, India. Most approaches to improving natural resource management in periurban contexts focus on mobilising the community; little attention is paid to reorienting the state or strengthening the user-bureaucracy interface. This paper describes the action research process that was followed to reorient civic agencies engaged in the provisioning of water and to break from a situation of distrust and prisoners' dilemma between water users and service providers. The paper argues that the creation and provision of a platform for direct engagement between water users and service providers can be a key tool for improving periurban water security. These platforms can provide support in building community resilience to face challenges such as climate variability and urbanisation, both of which threaten periurban water security. The action research emphasises on building the community's capacity to ask for improved water supply and to negotiate with state service providers, rather than augmenting water supply physically. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a diachronic analysis of genitive variation in five varieties of English. Based on a set of matching newspaper corpora from the 1960s and the early 2000s from the Bahamas, Jamaica, India, Great Britain, and the U.S., we look into variation and change in the underlying grammar of the genitive alternation, as defined by patterns of constraints affecting the variable. We employ random forests and Multifactorial Prediction and Deviation Analysis to analyze a richly annotated set of over 22,000 genitive tokens. Our analysis corroborates findings with regard to postcolonial Englishes, particularly in the Caribbean, that suggest that these varieties are partaking in American-led global trends in grammar toward, e.g., densification, without actually approximating American norms. We also notice that production-related constraints on genitive variation, such as syntactic weight or givenness, have increased their effects. While metropolitan and postcolonial Englishes share a core grammar of genitive variation, there is noticeable variation particularly with regard to semantic and socioculturally determined predictors such as text type. Overall, we see a widening gap between metropolitan and postcolonial Englishes. The case of Bahamian English is especially interesting as it appears fairly American-oriented during colonial times but has aligned with other postcolonial Englishes since independence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The current research has been conducted to study the ethnopharmacology research output in the past 10 years (2011–2020) after using Web of Science (WoS) database. The present study has used WoS database to collect the ethnopharmacology research output for the specific period. The retrieved data were analyzed using specific parameters. This study investigates the impact of the most productive institutes, countries, authors, subjects, sources, and keywords. For visualizing purposes, VOSviewer has been used. We retrieved 7,159 papers from WoS, consisting of 84.24% journal articles and 14.23% review articles. The data analysis indicates that consistent growth with increasing multiauthorship is a general trend of research. The Council of Scientific Industrial Research (CSIR) India collaborates with the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) and Central Institute of Medicinal Aromatic Plants (CIMAP) in terms of domestic collaboration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyses India's counter-terrorism diplomacy at the United Nations and argues that it is based on five pillars namely, normative, coercive, legal, compliance and domestic implementation, and promotion of international cooperation. The normative pillar elucidates India's stand on de-legitimisation of terrorism, the root cause approach and sectoral versus comprehensive approach, whereas the coercive pillar divulges India's position on counter-terrorism sanctions and the use of force. The legal measure explains India's contribution to the development of international legal framework against terrorism through its sponsoring, co-sponsoring, draft proposal and consensus-building initiatives. Methodologically, it is based largely on the analysis of the primary archival sources, speeches of Indian delegates at the UN General Assembly, its Sixth Committee, and India's national reports submitted to the UN Counter-Terrorism Committee and 1540 Committee. By analysing India's counter-terrorism diplomacy at the United Nations, this paper seeks to spark a discourse among researchers working in this field with cases of India and other states as well, and pave the way for further researches on India's counter-terrorism diplomacy at the United Nations and comparative studies with cases of other states. It concludes with observations that state sovereignty remains at the core of India's counter-terrorism diplomacy and given the divergence of preferences of states, India's diplomatic endeavour could not yield desired results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, several countries have made sustained efforts to project their 'soft power' abroad. Public diplomacy has been an important tool for this purpose. Public diplomacy involves activities usually undertaken by a national government to inform and influence foreign public opinion and attitudes in order to advance its foreign policy goals. Such activities include 'nation-branding', diaspora outreach, digital engagement, international broadcasting, and international exchange programmes, all of which are designed to promote a positive image and reputation of the country to a global audience. This paper discusses the role of public diplomacy in the service of India's foreign policy goals during the twenty-first century. The practice of public diplomacy helps the country achieve two significant objectives. First, it helps allay any active or dormant fears within the international community about India as a rising power. Second, it helps India compete with other countries as it seeks to boost foreign tourist arrivals, attract foreign investment and secure new markets for its exports in an era of globalisation. This paper also briefly discusses some of the challenges associated with India's use of public diplomacy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper sets out to investigate the effect of levels of income and ownership of assets on domestic migration. The inverted U theory points out that at low levels of incomes and wealth, households may not be able to afford the cost of migration, and hence, are left behind, leading to geographical poverty traps. This idea is tested using a household level migration choice model that attempts to explain outward migration by levels of income/wealth and other factors, including local amenities and social background. The inverted U theory breaks down at very low levels of income – there is a relatively higher probability of outward migration by households belongs to absolutely the lowest deciles of income. However, wealth, or lack thereof, does not have a similar effect on migration in this context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The world over, countries have been racing to control the spread of the Covid-19 pandemic. Central to the mitigation of the virus spread is the ability of nations to ensure behavior of its people adheres to the constraints imposed in the wake of the pandemic. However, there has been much variation in how individuals and collectives have responded in conformance to expected behavioral changes necessitated by the pandemic. The paper offers a cross-cultural and social identity perspective based on group categorizations to understand the variation in pandemic responses in the context of two different countries, that of India and the United States. Relevant cultural dimensions of difference shaping behavior such as individualism-collectivism, power distance, and other cultural norms shaping divergent behavioral responses in the US and India are examined. Differing group categorizations relevant for each country are also explored to understand the dynamics of behavioral response, be it adherence to mask wearing and following norms of social distancing, or the migrant labor exodus in India from urban to rural areas amidst the first wave of the pandemic. Implications for managing behavioral responses considering cross-cultural differences and group categorization processes are also discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The objective of this review was to identify and synthesize the findings of the existing literature that highlighted the psychosocial and mental health issues of the migrants during the COVID-19 pandemic in India. Materials and Methods: An exploration of the PubMed, Google Scholar, Web of Science, ScienceDirect, Google search, and some other manual searches was undertaken so that no relevant study was missed. A search on Indian scientific literature and cross-references retrieved was also conducted to get further information. The period of the search has been one year from March 1, 2020, to March 31, 2021. The database was searched with the terms "migrants," "migrant workers," "COVID-19 pandemic," "lockdown," "migrant population," "mental health issues," "psychosocial issues" to retrieve the published literature. Results: Initially, 48 research articles were retrieved and 10 of them were excluded as they had no sufficient information about mental and psychosocial challenges faced by the migrants. In the remaining 38 articles, 9 articles were original research work (n = 9) published from India related to the impact of COVID-19 on migrants. The second category consisted of editorials or commentary or letters to the editor or policy paper on psychosocial and mental health aspects of migrants during the COVID-19 pandemic (n = 17). The third category was 11 articles on perspectives or opinions or viewpoints (n = 11) related to various psychosocial and mental health issues among migrants in India during the COVID-19 pandemic. Predominantly psychosocial issues found among migrants were living conditions, basic needs, family concerns, and joblessness. The mental health issues found among migrants during the COVID-19 pandemic included psychological distress, depressive disorders, anxiety disorders, substance use disorders. Conclusion: Existing literature from India has shown that the COVID-19 pandemic severely impacted the psychosocial and mental health status of the migrants in India. This review suggests the need for more research work from the affected states of India and the development of psychosocial and mental health intervention strategies to minimize the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on migrants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper uses long-term research in an Indian village to develop Karl Mannheim's notion of each generation's 'fresh contact' with their inherited social and environmental setting. I examine how a generation of young people re-apprehend their local environment following a period of migration. I argue that young people aged between 25 and 34 who have lived outside their locality re-appraise their village economically and spiritually when they return home. I point to the social nature of this 'fresh contact', its spatial character, and the high degree of reflexivity that young men display in discussing their own agency as a generation – a point that emerged especially clearly in their discussion of the term 'mahaul,' a Hindi word meaning 'atmosphere'. The paper contributes to geographical and anthropological work on youth agency by highlighting the utility of notions of fresh contact in specific social conjunctures, such as the migration of a particular cohort. At the same time, it suggests the importance of placing alongside Mannheim's work an explicit focus on the spatial nature of fresh contact, the sociality that constitutes cohorts as generations, and young people's reflexive capacity to theorise their generational agency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents the use of thematic collages as a methodological innovation to participatory photography as a research framework. Participatory photography was used to understand the subjective "off-script" motivations behind the full or partial adoption of Zero Budget Natural Farming (ZBNF) by members of women's self-help groups in Andhra Pradesh, India. The addition of thematic collages to existing participatory photography methods was developed as a mechanism to better support the dialogic generation of new Freirean "generative themes" for investigation by a group. Further, the use of thematic collages invites the integration of "renegade" or non-thematic images into participant group analysis. ZBNF is an agricultural practice that has become an extension priority in Andhra Pradesh. It emphasizes the use of defined chemical-free inputs and regenerative farming techniques as a holistic approach toward socio-ecological resilience. As part of an interdisciplinary research project, this participatory photography design was piloted parallel to a soil science experiment in three geographically distinct agroecological zones in Andhra Pradesh. We show how participatory photography, with the novel addition of thematic collages, can be integrated into interdisciplinary research as a method to discover the underlying motivations to adopt agricultural practices and participate in agricultural movements like Zero Budget Natural Farming. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Countries must develop their capacity to credibly revise their nationally determined contributions (NDCs) proportionate to the global climate goal. This paper argues that long-lasting capacity is necessarily embedded in the institutions governing cooperation between state and non-state actors. This institutional capacity for cooperation is determined by the two interactive processes of conception and calibration, where the state plays a definitive role in mediating between competing interests. In conception, the state uses its discretionary power to set the long-term vision, whereas during calibration it exercises flexibility to accommodate concerns and capacity of other actors. We conclude that proportionality of policy response is better understood, and achieved, through the convergence of both these processes. Drawing on climate policy experiences of India and South Africa, we recommend that successful implementation and enhancement of NDCs would require a greater emphasis on capacity building for calibration in developing countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: India has the second-largest population of elderly in the world. Serious mental illness (SMI) is a subset of the mental disorders that result in significant functional impairment and is usually long term. Persons with SMI face several challenges in their old age that are different from the issues faced by younger people with SMI. Understanding the problems faced by elderly individuals suffering from SMI is fundamental for planning programs to address them. The SENIOR (Support Systems Evaluation of Neuropsychiatric Illness in Old age) project is a study aimed at evaluating the problems faced in obtaining mental health care by elderly persons having SMI in the Kerala state of India. Aim: To describe the scientific methodology of the SENIOR project. Methods: This study employs mixed-methods cross-sectional design among a minimum sample of 768 SMI patients identified through cluster sampling from three districts, and Focus Group Discussion among mental health program officials. Discussion: This paper presents a methodological model to assist researchers in future field epidemiological studies on mental illness. Assessing service needs and barriers to access for the most vulnerable among the mentally ill will help the policymakers make evidence-based decisions to improve their quality of life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

More than 300,000 women died due to pregnancy related causes in 2015, a global maternal mortality ratio (MMR) of 216 per 100,000 live births (Alkema et al., 2016). Millennium Development Goals have led to a 44% decline in global MMR, but significant variations still remain across geographical regions (United Nations [UN], 2015). India accounts for the second highest maternal deaths in the world (World Health Organization [WHO], 2015). In contrast, the U.S. is the only developed country with an increasing MMR in recent years ("Maternal Mortality," 2015). However, little attention has been given to maternal health in public policy research and practice in both countries. This paper compares and contrasts maternal health status and analyzes maternal health policies in India and the U.S. two health models. Based on comparative case analysis, the overall recommendation is to expand the scope of maternal health from a biomedical health model towards a biopsychosocial model and restructure the policy frameworks. This paper contributes to the maternal health discourse and hopes to garner attention of global and regional health policy scholars and policy makers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

For over 3 decades, participatory learning and action (PLA) techniques have been prominent in formative and evaluative studies in community-based development programs in the Global South. In this paper, we describe and discuss the use of PLA approaches at the beginning of a community-based program for prevention of violence against women and girls in Mumbai's urban informal settlements. We adapted six PLA techniques as part of a formative community mobilization and rapid needs assessment exercise, addressing perceptions of violence prevalence, sources of household conflict, experiences of safety and mobility, access to services, preferences for service and support, and visualization of an ideal community free from violence. We describe the collaborative process of developing and implementing PLA techniques and discuss its relevance in generating contextual and grounded understandings of violence as well as in identifying factors which can potentially enable and constrain interventions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Childhood anxiety disorders are common, chronic and cause impairment if left untreated. Early identification and treatment are, therefore, essential. Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT) for children with anxiety has increasingly received attention from researchers worldwide. It is now accepted that CBT should be the first line of treatment for children with anxiety. The fact that it is based on skills training for the child and also incorporates parents as co-therapists make it important to establish a strong foundation for problem-solving, anxiety management and coping skills which will be useful for all future encounters with anxiety provoking situations. It is necessary to modify the CBT techniques based on the population that is being catered to, and it is also important to incorporate cultural, social and language factors into the modules that are created for specific populations. In India, common presentations of anxiety could be in the form of somatic symptoms or academic underachievement. The primary focus of this paper is to highlight the utility of this approach in low resource settings such as India with suggestions for its modifications for use in the clinical setting. Existing lowcost models are described. Unique issues in implementing CBT in India are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: COVID-19 has a profound impact on people with existing mental disorders, augmenting the prevailing inequalities in mental health. Methods: In order to understand the status of telepsychiatry in India and the role of artificial intelligence (AI) in mental health and its potential applications, a scoping review was done between March 2020 and May 2020. The literature review revealed 253 papers, which were used to derive the primary framework for analysis. The information was then reviewed for ideas and concepts, which were integrated with evidence from gray literature and categorized under broader themes based on the insights derived. Finally, a thematic framework was developed for discussion to tailor scientific information for decision-makers' needs. Results: Review findings are summarized under the following headings: changing patterns of health-seeking behavior, origin and evolution of telepsychiatry, possible applications of telepsychiatry and AI, technological features, and AI models in mental health. Conclusions: Though there are several potential opportunities, the time is not yet ripe for telepsychiatry and AI to be adopted fully in the field of mental health care. But it is time that we develop indigenous proprietary technology and test and validate it. With many solutions offered by telepsychiatry and AI, psychiatrists must choose an appropriate tool based on their requirements, availability of resources, and feasibility of deployment. Harmony between conventional care and technology-based care must be reached gradually. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As a poet, journalist, autobiographer, and travel writer, Dom Moraes was a prolific presence in the Anglophone literary world throughout the second half of the twentieth century. Though born in Bombay, Moraes had moved to England at a young age and his very first book of poetry, A Beginning, had earned him fame in the emergent post-Second World War British cultural scene of the late 1950s and early 1960s, winning him the Hawthornden Prize at the age of 19. He was equally popular when he came back to India during the 1980s, and regular volumes of his poetry and prose were published by the newly established Penguin Books India until his death in 2004. Surprisingly, in spite of being such a well-known and well-published author, Moraes's work in general, and his poetry in particular, have strangely fallen out of critical focus. My article explores this contradictory situation of an apparently famous poet being persistently ignored by critics and anthologists. It attempts to show how this unusual situation can be traced back to a sense of bafflement that most critics and anthologists share when it comes to categorizing Moraes so as to initiate a discussion on him. It also attempts to depict how this sense of puzzlement in categorizing Moraes is connected to Moraes's own ambivalent attitude towards India, his country of birth, which frequently vacillates between a strong sense of aversion and a feeling of deep empathy. In conclusion, the paper tries to probe how Moraes grapples with his complex sense of affiliation to and distance from India by representing his creative self and its cultural location in the form of a variety of absences — a process which makes him difficult to categorize and as a consequence challenging to discuss. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article is an attempt to relook at the treaties of 1949 and 2007 between India and Bhutan and argues that the 2007 Treaty is the outcome of the evolution and maturity of Bhutan as an independent and sovereign state, that it is imperative for India to make constant adjustments in its foreign policy towards Bhutan to secure its influence in the tiny but important country and maintain the strength of India–Bhutan bilateral relations. From the side of Bhutan, it is also important to have an 'alliance shelter', and India is best suited to meeting Bhutan's needs for political, economic, societal and strategic shelter. 1 By using a historical approach, this article shows why it was necessary for the two countries to renew the 1949 Treaty in the first decade of the twenty-first century. The article uses historical methodology, in combination with interdisciplinary methods such as comparative analysis, generalisation, and expert interviews. Major sources for the paper include the texts of the Treaties, speeches by political leaders and published articles and books by international writers, including writers from India, Bhutan and Vietnam. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

India's status as the world's leading milk producer is significantly sustained by cow slaughter, a criminal act in most Indian states. The paper argues that jugaad, a complex Indian sociological phenomenon of corruption and innovation, is vital in enabling the illegal slaughter of cows on an industrial scale in the informal economy. Jugaad is enacted through ingenious alterations to social processes and material products in two 'grey' and informal spaces that are rendered exceptional to formal governance: (1) illicit transportation to slaughterhouses; and (2) intricate social contracts between stakeholders along this production line. Through these processes in informal spaces, the bovine body itself is transformed by way of jugaad from protected dairy cow to contraband beef cow. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: In low- and middle-income countries (LMIC), major mental disorders often remain untreated because of barriers related to access and resources. In rural areas and in conflict-ridden regions, the problem can be exacerbated by increased rates of mental illness and by reduced access to care. This paper describes a project designed to provide mental health services for major mental disorders among youth using a low-cost model in a rural district of the troubled Kashmir valley.Methods: We describe the geographic and political context, the guiding principles and adaptation of the service model (through partnership with a voluntary organization and use of technology), and the implementation of the model using Theory of Change framework. The core of the intervention was to train a pool of lay health workers (LHWs) to provide mental health services to young (aged 14-30 years) people with major mental disorders in their own communities, supported by clinical professionals.Results: Despite political turmoil and major floods, 40 (male and female) LHWs were trained. The LHWs efficiently engaged in case identification, basic interventions, and data collection on outcomes. Several different stakeholders were engaged in activities relevant to the objectives of the project; however, the use of technologies was moderated by several challenges, including access to internet services and patient preference for personal contact.Conclusions: This service model is applicable in an environment where protracted political and armed conflict, low resources, and geographical isolation make exclusive reliance on scarce professional services impractical. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the work-lives of middle class Muslim professionals in India's new service economy. While these workers have successfully negotiated labour market entry into the ‘core’ growth sectors of India's globalising economy, they are simultaneously subject to different forms of social, cultural and political marginalisation. Strikingly, they also remain at the margins of both economic geography and development geography scholarship. The paper extends a growing development geography/economic geography ‘intellectual trading zone’ and enhances understandings of the complex relationships between labour agency, marginality and social inclusion. The paper draws on new survey data to document patterns of labour agency amongst Muslim professionals in New Delhi. This is augmented by interviews with Muslim professionals to show how different forms of marginality are experienced in their everyday work-lives and the strategies and agencies articulated towards (re)working those marginalities. The paper concludes by reflecting on the broader implications of these findings in relation to socially inclusive growth, the middle-class transformation of India's Muslims and wider understandings of marginality and worker agency. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper argues that colonial biopolitics and informality co-produce a ‘state of exception' for nonhuman animals in cities, based on the socio-political construct of a human/animal binary. This state is enacted by exceptionalising animals as not-persons, and humans as not-animals, and through urbanisation, a uniquely human claim on land. ‘Colonial' is understood in an anthropocentric sense of (privileged) human imperialism over nonhumans and poor humans. Informality, a carefully produced condition that is exceptional to formal governance and planning, legitimises the view of animals (and poor humans) as ‘trespassers' in urban spaces. This paper examines street canines in Indian cities, demonstrating their marginalisation and eviction at the intersection of colonialism and informality. Last, this paper builds upon ‘subaltern urbanism’ that recognises the agency inherent in marginalised citizens and spaces, to conceptualise ‘subaltern animism’ as a way of acknowledging animal spaces and citizenship in the city. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]