Greater Delhi Research Articles

Observational evidence of elevated smoke layers during crop residue burning season over Delhi: Potential implications on associated heterogeneous PM2.5 enhancements

Post monsoonal agricultural Crop Residue Burning (CRB) over northwestern India is believed to severely affect the air quality of the megacity of Delhi. However, the mechanistic understanding remains elusive. Long-term satellite observations (2007–2020) of aerosol properties during CRB season (Oct 20th to Nov 20th) indicate a distinct airshed of CRB plume transport from Northwestern India (source region) to greater Delhi (downwind region). Theoretically, the smoke concentration should disperse downwind, and the CRB-associated PM2.5 enhancement over Northern India should be inversely proportional to the distance from the CRB source region. However, the in-situ PM2.5 observations illustrate that smoke-associated enhancement in PM2.5 over greater Delhi (downwind region) is disproportionately large compared to the source region. In this study, we examine satellite, radiosonde, and ground-based observations along with reanalysis data to provide robust evidence that aerosol- boundary layer - PM2.5 associations via semi-direct effect can explain the above heterogeneity. Vertically resolved satellite observations indicate that as the emitted CRB-smoke plumes travel downwind, a portion of the transported smoke plume injected relatively at a higher altitude leads to the formation of an elevated smoke layer over greater Delhi. These elevated smoke layers tend to suppress the mixing height via inducing strong temperature inversion, thereby severely constraining the daytime dilution effect of shallow boundary layers. Along with direct advection of smoke particles, enhanced accumulation of local urban emissions due to these semi-direct impacts can lead to the observed disproportionate PM2.5 enhancements over Delhi during CRB haze periods. Thus, control of the local anthropogenic emissions could bring relief during the extreme haze episodes over Delhi.

The Making of Urban Peripheries and Peripheral Labor: Brick Kilns and Circular Migration in and beyond Greater Delhi

The paper proposes a reading of the urban periphery from a labor-centered perspective, according to which its relational geography is indexed to the mobility of marginalized migrant workers and labor processes. Specifically, it attempts to rethink the urban periphery from the vantage point of peri-urban brick kilns and brick kiln workers. The paper draws parallels between the displacement of brick kilns to the peri-urban and the precarious migration of brick kiln workers by highlighting the tenuous tie between brick kiln workers and the urban space embedded in both. The paper first outlines the historical process of the outward displacement of brick kilns from Delhi to peri-urban villages in Haryana as a result of various pieces of legislation, judicial rulings and planning discourses. It then turns to contemporary forms of circulation between the kilns and the core city. Drawing from fieldwork data generated out of kiln workers’ life histories, it explores the various factors conditioning mobility and the reasons why workers circulate between the brick kilns and different urban occupations at different moments in their lives. The paper argues that exclusionary urbanization processes, in tandem with migrants’ life cycle choices, produce migrant workers as peripheral subjects while they contribute to the production of the urban periphery.

A qualitative case study of child protection issues in the Indian construction industry: investigating the security, health, and interrelated rights of migrant families.

BackgroundMany of India’s estimated 40 million migrant workers in the construction industry migrate with their children. Though India is undergoing rapid economic growth, numerous child protection issues remain. Migrant workers and their children face serious threats to their health, safety, and well-being. We examined risk and protective factors influencing the basic rights and protections of children and families living and working at a construction site outside Delhi.MethodsUsing case study methods and a rights-based model of child protection, the SAFE model, we triangulated data from in-depth interviews with stakeholders on and near the site (including employees, middlemen, and managers); 14 participants, interviews with child protection and corporate policy experts in greater Delhi (8 participants), and focus group discussions (FGD) with workers (4 FGDs, 25 members) and their children (2 FGDs, 9 members).ResultsAnalyses illuminated complex and interrelated stressors characterizing the health and well-being of migrant workers and their children in urban settings. These included limited access to healthcare, few educational opportunities, piecemeal wages, and unsafe or unsanitary living and working conditions. Analyses also identified both protective and potentially dangerous survival strategies, such as child labor, undertaken by migrant families in the face of these challenges.ConclusionsBy exploring the risks faced by migrant workers and their children in the urban construction industry in India, we illustrate the alarming implications for their health, safety, livelihoods, and development. Our findings, illuminated through the SAFE model, call attention to the need for enhanced systems of corporate and government accountability as well as the implementation of holistic child-focused and child-friendly policies and programs in order to ensure the rights and protection of this hyper-mobile, and often invisible, population.

A Simple Method to Hide Data Loggers Safely in Observation Wells

Submersible data loggers are widely used for groundwater monitoring, but their application often runs the risk of hardware and data loss through vandalism or theft. During a field study in India, the authors of this article experienced that well locks attract the attention of unauthorized persons and do not provide secure protection in unattended areas. To minimize the risk of losing data loggers, a cheap and simple solution has been invented to hide the instruments and associated attachments below the ground surface, inside observation wells. It relies on attaching the logger to a length of small-diameter pipe that is submerged at the bottom of the well, instead of attaching it to the top of the well. The small-diameter pipe with the logger is connected to a small bottle containing a magnet that floats on the water surface of the well and can be recovered using another bottle also with a magnet. A logger that is concealed in this way is difficult to detect and access without knowledge of the method and adequate removal tools. The system was tested and successfully applied for monitoring shallow observation wells at three field sites in Greater Delhi, India.

Mass Media Use and Modernization in Greater Delhi Basties

Findings indicate education is the principal predictor of media behavior, and that empathy, modernity and political participation are closely related, thus strengthening the hypothesis that such variables activate and support each other.

Mass Media Use Patterns in the Indian Slums: a Study of Four Basties in Greater Delhi

Mass Media Use Patterns in the Indian Slums: a Study of Four Basties in Greater Delhi

Book Review: Urbanisation and Urban India by N. V. Sovani, Asia Publishing House, 1966, pp. 160, 45/Indian Cities : Characteristics and Correlates by Q. Ahmad, Chicago Department of Geography Research Paper No. 102, 1965, pp. 184, $4 Greater Delhi by V. K. R. V. Rao and P. B. Desai, Asia Publishing House, 1965, PP. 479, £5 Towns of Mysore State

Book Review: Urbanisation and Urban India by N. V. Sovani, Asia Publishing House, 1966, pp. 160, 45/Indian Cities : Characteristics and Correlates by Q. Ahmad, Chicago Department of Geography Research Paper No. 102, 1965, pp. 184, $4 Greater Delhi by V. K. R. V. Rao and P. B. Desai, Asia Publishing House, 1965, PP. 479, £5 Towns of Mysore State