Indian Village Research Articles

Placing Indian Village System in the Centre of Development-Induced Displacement Discourse

The contemporary development process under the impact of neo-liberal policies has rapidly changed and restructured the socio-economic sphere of village life in India. The evolving pattern of rural society has turned its socio-economic structure into a complex space full of contradictions. As a result, the geographical space has been altered in terms of the representation of maps, information, and ideological interests. These spatial patterns have added to the complexities of space that have attracted scholars who relate it to new theories in developmental economics. The present paper attempts to analyse some of these aspects of the Indian rural society undergoing the process of development and displacement and its impact on different socio-economic groups, i.e., peasants, small and marginal farmers, share-croppers, artisans, agricultural labourers, and landless labourers. One-sided development, especially in the agrarian economy, disturbs the traditional skill, livelihood, and social order ultimately spreading the issues of unsustainable livelihood, hardship, and marginalization in peri-urban areas. Reskilling and participation in the decision-making process of the displaced people of developing society have become a challenging issue for policy orientation related to Development Induced Displacement (DID).

Solutions for health care enigma in Indian villages

Solutions for health care enigma in Indian villages

A New Investment Opportunity: Bitcoin & Ethereum Cryptocurrency

Cryptocurrency is fastly gaining interest among Investors in India. In the past few years, there was a tremendous change in the number of investors and analysts suggest that cryptocurrency is not only for city slickers but also for small towns. Many of the investors of Cryptocurrency are from small towns and villages in India. This may prove that the cryptocurrency may serve as another medium of exchange and also another way of storing valuable metals etc as a property. This paper estimates the different types of Crypto Currency of BitCoin and Ethereum through different type of Analytical tools like Time Series Analysis ,ANOVA ,Correlation and Decision tree analysis and suggest for better investment strategies.

Agricultural greenhouse gas emissions of an Indian village - Who's to blame: crops or livestock?

A carbon footprint assessment, combining various scales of analysis and including a territorial assessment, is proposed to estimate the greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from crops and livestock in an Indian village impacted by both Green (for crops) and White (for milk) revolutions. It is based on the GHG assessment of 10 cropping systems, 8 livestock farming systems and 9 production systems using the comparative agriculture and Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) approaches. Results show that mineral fertilisation, irrigation and methane from paddy fields are the main drivers of emissions at plot level. Livestock farming systems emit from 4.7 tCO2eq/female to 8.6 tCO2eq/female, enteric fermentation being the first source of emission. Disparities at farm level are huge, ranging from 9 to 733 tCO2eq. At village level, emissions yield 37 tCO2eq/ha and livestock contributes to 60 % of GHG emissions. The high GHG emissions are a legacy of the Green and White Revolutions: the livestock population is high, fed on highly emissive fodder and concentrates and produces little milk. The results enhance our understanding of the share of carbon emissions from crops and livestock at farm and territorial level. They pinpoint the environmental and socio-economic downsides of livestock farming intensification.

Modelling and techno-economic analysis of standalone SPV/Wind hybrid renewable energy system with lead-acid battery technology for rural applications

The present work discusses an enhanced optimal solution for electrifying an individual rural consumer in a northern Indian village. The optimisation and sizing assessment is based on the techno-economic and socio-environmental parameters. The real-time market-based design variables have been considered for the present investigation. The renewable resources are assessed by the PDAV tool from NASA linked to the HOMER-Pro software tool. A stand-alone hybrid renewable energy system is designed for the domestic load of 55.14 kWh/day and 11.71 kW peak demand. The comparative analysis finds the stand-alone Solar Photovoltaic and Wind energy hybrid renewable energy system suitable. The net present and energy costs are determined as $34,344 and 0.152$/kWh for an optimized Hybrid System. In the present work, the employment creation with social aspects of the renewable energy system is analysed in a distinguished manner. A novel approach is adapted for the environmental effect of hybrid energy systems. The sensitivity analysis and robustness viability has been performed for the optimized arrangement. In the scope of optimal sizing, an equivalent model of the hybrid energy system is recreated in Matlab/Simulink. Each Matlab/Simulink model section is analysed separately with better technical aspects for the different input parameters.

Automated Electronic System for Census Process

Present-day censuses are generally completed in physical modes wherein the authorities need to go from door to door to gather the necessary information. All the Censuses to date have been directed similarly, and in this way require a ton of on-ground authorities for the same. Likewise, a ton of desk work is needed to have been kept up within this interaction making it a bulky interaction. There have been ongoing advancements in having an application for completing the Census, yet even that has numerous limits. Since for this situation individuals can get to the application and give the responses all alone, it can prompt off-base or deceiving information bringing about the failure of the reviews. Likewise, not all individuals can utilize portable applications with no help. Also, it has been referenced in the Lok Sabha that over 25000 villages in India still lack mobile and internet coverage. Because of this absence of web entrance in distant regions, the past conventional techniques for taking overviews are still in practice. Hence, in this paper, we introduce a new approach, an Automated survey system for the census process. The proposed system is faster and more authentic than the traditional process of pen and paper. All the data is collected digitally and stored directly into datasets, therefore data storage and retrieval are no longer cumbersome. This collected data is far easier to analyze. The authenticity is provided by Biometric sensors.

People's care seeking journey for a chronic illness in rural India: Implications for policy and practice

Drawing on interviews conducted in 2019–2020, across twenty villages in India, this paper unpacks how people with chronic illness navigate complex care-seeking terrain. We show how the act of seeking care involves navigating through personal, family, social, economic, cultural, and most importantly, difficult health systems spaces—and entails making difficult social, moral, and financial choices. We show how the absence of reliable and accessible points of first contact for primary care results in people running from pillar to post, taking wrong turns, and becoming disappointed, frustrated, and, sometimes, impoverished. We reveal the complex individual and social dynamics of hope and misplaced and misguided expectations, as well as social obligations and their performance that animate the act of navigating care in rural India. We shine light on how a health system with weak primary care and poor regulation amplifies the medical, social, and financial consequences of an otherwise manageable chronic illness, and how these consequences are the worst for those with the least social, network and economic capital. Crucially we highlight the problematic normalisation of the absence of reliable primary care services for chronic illness in India, in rural India specifically. We signpost implications for research, and for policy and practice in India and similar health system contexts, i.e. those with weak primary care and poor regulation of the private sector.We argue that in India, having in place accessible, good quality, and trustworthy sources of advice and care for chronic illness at the first point of call, for all, is critical. We contend that this first point of call should be quality, public primary care services. We conclude that if such arrangements are in place in public services, people will use them.

The emergence of private high schools in India: The impact of public-private competition on public school students

We study the entry of private secondary schools into 240 Indian villages previously served by public schools only—comparing student outcomes in these villages with outcomes in several thousand villages with no private schools. Consistent with predictions of a model of private–public school competition, we find evidence of stratification in terms of academic preparation and socioeconomic status. High-performing students sort into private schools, as do students from affluent families and from relatively privileged castes (especially males). In principle such stratification might undermine public schools, but our analysis of students across the socioeconomic spectrum shows no evidence of harm to those who remain in public schools.

Towards convergence of central grid and decentralised electricity solutions – Assessment of Indian rural electrification cases using a socio-technical framework

The paper examines the dynamics of rural electrification in India and explores the transition to a complementary convergence of decentralised and centralised electricity systems for sustainable rural electricity services. A novel socio-technical framework of analysis for assessment of cases of rural electricity systems is developed and applied in Indian villages to explore the interplays of different elements of rural electricity systems, enabling and hindering factors, and actors and institutions that affect the governance and sustenance of rural electrification. A mixed research method, along with document analysis, was applied to study the socio-technical perspectives, using 21 indicators representing nine different interplays of elements of rural electricity systems. The analysis reveals there is a significant effect of governance on technology performance, which in turn affects customer practices. There is also a significant correlation between customer practices and governance. Policy enablers along with strong institutions and actors - both at the subnational and local level - are key drivers to effective governance. Furthermore, irrespective of centralised or decentralised technology, adequacy and reliability of electricity supply and effective customer service delivery at the local level are important i.e., both supply reliability and quality, and customer service quality are equally important. The findings have clear policy implications for the governance of the electricity sector in India.

A study of marketing strategies used by Indian artisans during the Covid-19 crisis

70% of the population lives in villages in India. Time and again, we have underestimated this part of our population while thinking about our country’s economic growth. However, the true spirit and skills of Indian crafts live in rural areas that are self-sufficient and self-reliant. Indian crafts have evolved from the Vedic Era to Indus Valley civilization to Mauryan Era to the Mughal Era, and currently the Modern Indian Era. However, with industrialization and the informal nature of the sector, Indian crafts had started losing relevance. Though 90% population is uneducated, Indian crafts are highly skill-based. Today with the advent of technology, awareness among the new generation of artisans, emerging sectors of the economy, Indian crafts are being revived with the help of craft activists and platforms created for uplifting the community. Slowly as this sector started reviving itself and generated awareness and business, a novel coronavirus pandemic has affected their livelihood. Most artisans have an informal setup. The uncertainty of the situation, ruptured supply chain, canceled orders, and customers’ non-engagement in buying the products; have blurred their future. With no raw materials, no business, no demand, and a huge inventory of canceled orders, various platforms are being created to market their products and generate funds. A study of the marketing strategy is important to know the way forward.

Roads and Loans

AbstractDoes financing respond to changes in productive opportunities, even for the world’s poor? We answer this question by examining the response of private bank financing to an infrastructure program that brought road access to unconnected Indian villages. This program prioritized roads for villages above specific population thresholds, allowing us to exploit the resultant discontinuities for identification. Using detailed data from a large bank, we find that 75$\%$ more villagers get loans, and the average amount lent to them is 30$\%$–35$\%$ higher, in villages just above these thresholds. District-level analyses further suggest that roads and loans are complements in the growth process.Authors have furnished an Internet Appendix, which is available on the Oxford University Press Web site next to the link to the final published paper online.

Can Geographical Indications Support the Indian Village Economy Impacted by the Ongoing Economic Crisis Caused by COVID-19?

The post-COVID-19 economic crisis has resulted in widespread unemployment and the migration of workers in India, particularly in the informal sector, which accounts for more than 90 percent of total employment in the country. Migrant workers are returning to their homes and will soon be looking for alternative sources of income. Entrepreneurship centered on locally made traditional products can provide revenue to migrant workers in such conditions. These returning underprivileged workers can use their traditional knowledge and skills to support their families and create new employment opportunities in their communities. Laws relating to geographical indications will aid in the protection and promotion of such traditional product lines in domestic consumer markets. The protection and promotion of such traditional product lines in domestic consumer markets will be aided by laws relating to geographical indications. The same can be further complemented by the new Geneva Act of the Lisbon Agreement, which went into effect in February 2020 and allows for the registration system of Geographical Indications in multiple countries through a single procedure with the World Intellectual Property Organization. As a result, it is proposed that the government should promote geographical indications as a policy instrument to help the rural economy during these ongoing difficult times.

Detection of Fungal Infections in Gloriosa Superba Plant Using the Convolution Neural Network Model

Herbal treatments’ efficacy, safety, and mild side effects are also high priorities in primary care. Furthermore, as the world’s population expands, food production becomes more difficult. We need to use innovative biotechnology-based fertilization technologies to boost food production output. Gloriosa superba is one of the most well-known plants for its antibacterial and medicinal capabilities. The money plant is also known as the Gloriosa superba. We used a deep learning-based convolution neural network (CNN) classifier model to optimize the CNN algorithm parameter for better prediction. The enhanced particle swarm optimization (PSO) technique was used for optimization. Scale-invariant feature transform (SIFT) was used to extract the fungal spotted area. Digital camera with a high resolution acquires 300 dataset photographs from different villages in India for this investigation. Using a real-time fungal-affected image to train and test the model, different parametric measures are used to assess the model’s performance. The categorization accuracy obtained in this experiment was 99.32 percent.

Assessing the Outreach of Targeted Development Programmes—A Case Study from a South Indian Village

This paper explores beneficiary targeting of government programmes in a village in India. The analysis is based on all 228 households of the village and focus group discussions. The results show that there is a large exclusion error in targeted programmes, which have mostly excluded the poor and the needy. Most schemes have a prerequisite of asset ownership, such as agricultural land, which benefits resource-rich farmers with large landholdings. The relationship between benefits received and income of households is best represented by an inverted ‘u’-shape curve, indicating the middle-income category benefits more than the poorest. The scope and scale of welfare programmes, especially Direct Benefit Transfers, increased during the COVID-19 pandemic. For inclusion of the poorest of the poor, welfare and development schemes need to be decoupled from landownership in rural areas.

SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT AND ENVIRONMENTAL EDUCATION IN THE DESSANA INDIAN VILLAGE, TUPÉ/MANAUS/ AM.

This research has the theme sustainable development throughout environmental education, in the Dessana indian village, based in the Tupé community, in Manaus, Amazonas State. The aims were all focused on developing pedagogical proposals so that the Dessana Tupé-AM community indians get to know the theme of sustainable development and environmental education. It has been used, as methodology, on-site field research which showed the Dessana community inserted in a economic system, that determined social context amendments in this people, making possible service offering, such as turistics visits in village na on their territory, cultural presentations in resorts and in other turísticas spaces, craft selling, with the goal of preserve the culture, the traditional knowledge and sustainability. However, when it comes to environment preservation it is possible noticing that the indian village have not gain yet actions that inform about the existance of material that do not decompose naturally, as the organic products, something learnt with their ancestors experiences. Therefore, it urges Environmental Educational actions to avoid enviromental impacts. From this contexto on, it has been designed a pedagogical proposal with the insertion of a booklet that aims to demonstrate the enviroment education journey and development that intends to contribute with a learning process in a more significant way, for their own contextualization and recognition on the environment they are.

Association of ambient and household air pollution with lung function in young adults in an peri-urban area of South-India: A cross-sectional study.

Although there is evidence for the association between air pollution and decreased lung function in children, evidence for adolescents and young adults is scarce. For a peri-urban area in India, we evaluated the association of ambient PM2.5 and household air pollution with lung function for young adults who had recently attained their expected maximum lung function. We measured, using a standardized protocol, forced expiratory volume in the first second (FEV1) and forced vital capacity (FVC) in participants aged 20-26years from the third follow-up of the population-based APCAPCS cohort (2010-2012) in 28 Indian villages. We estimated annual average PM2.5outdoors at residence using land-use regression. Biomass cooking fuel (a proxy for levels of household air pollution) was self-reported. We fitted a within-between linear-mixed model with random intercepts by village, adjusting for potential confounders. We evaluated 1,044 participants with mean age of 22.8 (SD=1) years (range 20-26years); 327 participants (31%) were female. Only males reported use of tobacco smoking (9% of all participants, 13% of males). The mean ambient PM2.5 exposure was 32.9 (SD=2.8) µg/m3; 76% reported use of biomass as cooking fuel. The adjusted association between 1µg/m3 increase in PM2.5 was -27ml (95% CI, -89 to 34) for FEV1 and -5 ml (95% CI, -93 to 76) for FVC. The adjusted association between use of biomass was -112ml (95% CI, -211 to -13) for FEV1 and -142ml (95% CI, -285 to 0) for FVC. The adjusted association was of greater magnitude for those with unvented stove (-158ml, 95% CI, -279 to -36 for FEV1 and -211ml, 95% CI, -386 to -36 for FVC). We observed negative associations between ambient PM2.5 and household air pollution and lung function in young adults who had recently attained their maximum lung function.

Small Farmers and Agricultural Transformation: A Sociological Study in three Villages of India

Small Farmers and Agricultural Transformation: A Sociological Study in three Villages of India

DIGITAL INDIA : PROSPECTS, PROBLEMS AND POSSIBILITIES

The 21st century is the century of digitalization. In this epoch of the digital revolution, the Government of India has taken up a tremendous challenge to make its services accessible to every citizen of India through a digital medium. According to Census 2011, there were 664369 villages in India, intending to provide online systems and internet connectivity in the outlying areas of the country which seeks to connect the nation's economic transactions digitally. There are many obstacles in this digital revolution. Especially poor infrastructure, lack of digital instruments, low internet speed, non-availability of digital services in local languages, fear of cybercrime, slow and overdue infrastructure advancement. If all these problems are deciphered then India will be a digital nation. This paper seeks to shed light on the challenges and opportunities facing the Digital India Program.

TRADITIONAL CRAFT SKILLS IN INDIA- REFLECTION OF SIKKI CRAFT OF BIHAR AND PATHWAYS TO SUSTAINABILITY

Indian Handicrafts have a value beyond the capacity to earn and make a profit. The myriad craft is the living links to the past, including the perseverance of cultural meaning for the future. The present research focuses on defending the traditional knowledge of the skills taught in the craftsmen of the villages of India. This paper is aimed at documenting the Sikki craft of Bakuli, Bihar, India. Exploring and reflecting cultural phenomena and overcome the problems of cultural loss and intellectual potential of the craftsmen. An ethnographic research design with visual documentation was used to collect the data regarding the production of the craft, to bump up the income of the products & to sustain the skills and protect the craftsmen traditional knowledge resources.The cultural loses can be resolved using the product diversification strategy and designing jewellery of the craft could be a possible path to attain a platform worldwide.

PANCHAYTI RAJ INSTITUTIONS AND RURAL DEVELOPMENT IN HIMACHAL PRADESH

India is basically country of villages. Our entire system is based on the villages. Besides the increasing urban population, after more than seven decades of independence our economy is depending on agro based. Presently, more than Seventy percent of the population still resides in the villages. Keeping in broader prospect of Indian society, rural development is one of the major aspects of India System. Without rural development, development of Indian society is not possible. Our past experience proves that without participation of rural masses, rural development is not possible. Hence there is close relationship between the Panchayti raj Institutions and rural development. Panchayats have been the backbone of grassroots democracy in the Indian villages from ancient times. The 73rd constitutional Amendment Act granted constitutional status to the grassroots system and gave more powers to implementation of rural development programmes, policies and schemes. Himachal Pradesh is one of ideal state of India. It came in to being on 15th April 1948. Before the formation of Himachal Pradesh, no attention was paid to economic development and social welfare of the people in princely states. Only some efforts were made by the rulers in their states. The systematic evaluation of resources and their scientific exploitation was started in only after the formation of Himachal Pradesh as full-fledged state. It is only then that the people and the government of the Pradesh started making concerted efforts to improve socio economic condition of the people. Present paper evaluates the role of Panchayats in rural development in Himachal Pradesh. The study is based on the secondary data.