Peripherally yours, Chennai

 

Centrifugal forces have been acting on me at large,  and over the decades, getting me to explore new facets of Madras – now Chennai – in its different facets.  We would  as kids travel from Delhi to Madras, spend a few days in Mylapore and quickly take the meter gauge train from Egmore to Thanjavur and descend further into quaintness. 

Yes, there was less traffic in Madras, and yes the pace was unhurried, but the poverty was stark, and the differences between haves and have-nots was a really deep chasm.  By early 1980s things began to change – we moved to Adyar while grandparents lived in Mylapore, a few airconditioned joints showed up in Mt. Road, a hole in the wall in Adyar had a name called Hungry Tiger doling what was called Pizza, and if we needed Chinese food, we could catch a 5B, or drive a herald or a vespa and eat at Waldorfs just before the IIT gate,.  A decade and more later, with Ford at Maraimalai nagar, and TCS at the TIDEL park in madras, the city actually had a consuming middle class – along with an array of restaurants – Eden, Wangs Kitchen, Dasa Dosa, Cascade and the like that kept those looking to unwind a place to do so, in airconditioned comfort and friendly service.  And with movie theatres and a mall (Spencers) and the sabhas in December for the cultural affirmation.  If people wanted an outing and a swig,  Mahabs was an hour away and two hours more there was Pondy.     And for an evening stroll on the beach there was Bessie,.  Madras or Chennai seemed to still retain that cosy feel, while growing in comforts.  Those who were in were in.  Lets leave it at that.

Perhaps our future has little in common with the black hole, with its mammoth inward pull..  As it often happen in these modern times, people find other places and pursuit to disperse into.   While life had taken me to US for a decade and more I have found a nest in the cooler Bengaluru, assignments and family still calls me to Chennai – but this time around it is as far away as Kalyan is from Churchgate.   To places like Maraimalai Nagar and more.  Even a city with a reputation for efficiency as Chennai will throw a traffic jam or two if the commute is 50 KM.  I found that the magic lies in multimodal transport – a fast airconditioned metro to Meenambakkam and an Uber from there.  Sometimes meetings would yank me around like a yo-yo from south Chennai to places like Padi.  So I get Uber to take me around.  My first question to the Uber driver is, is the AC good.  Some of them will say – sir – come to the front.  And  in the next 40 minutes I would strike a conversation or sometimes listen in to their world.  His daughter asking when is he going to come home – his wife asking him to buy sweets as guests are coming.  I would ask them where are they from – Bodi, Ramanthapuram, Chengam, Nellore.   The drivers are a polite lot, each having a different taste – the radio-stations whose film songs play to the lowest common denominator in any language were often ignored by the drivers – “yaaru sir, atheu paatu kaettindu, thalai than valikum – who can listen to these songs again and again – it is just a headache”.  Some of them play a downloaded movie on their cell phone – Jai Bhim – that’s discerning..  he turned down the volume and turned to me and said – sir – my target is 3000 rupees a day, 25 days a month.  If I do that I run my home, take my family to the movies, send my kid to an English medium school and send money to my village,  Another driver drove clients from Truichy and was trying to Uber his way back, at least till Mahindra world city to cover his fuel and toll.  He said Truichy is not an Uber city – he has his network of tourist hotels and thrives on temple tourism.   Most recently a Wagon R  had a large central console – the driver logged me in, touched the touch screen, scrolled to a You tube channel in Tamilnadu – the topic was polluting thermal power and nuclear plants and their safety.. what happened in Fukushima was lucidly explained.  So I asked the driver is he an engineer – yes – I drive Uber sometimes – and he talked about solar panels in every-rooftop with batteries to reduce load on thermal power and much more -  yes – we prosper here because there is peace and there are no divisions based on religion and there should not be any class / caste differences –no one higher and no one lower,  if that really happens it would be even better.   Mylapore is of course 50 KM away from these conversations.  The evening took us to the fabled Old Mahabalipruram Road – from GST road, and Vandalur, bisecting the gloriously wooded  zoo the  left and some land cornered by forest department – equally wooded to the right.  More patches of lakes and woods followed – giving way to VIT,  and then residential towers and IT parks and on to Old Mahabalipuram Road – Madhya Kailash (at Adyar) – 30 KMs it said – while IT complexes and swank apartments sprung out of land in or abutting water bodies – with restaurants and malls on the main road.  A new Chennai – hopefully a bit more peripheral to the hardened divisions of class and more, knitted together by Ubers in case one wants to mingle a bit more by design or circumstance, instead of our own cocoons of commute to office and home.

For the threads that bind...

 

On the threads that bind…

Happy xxxx is a greeting often seen in social media, and today’s feed was no different. A day spent to honest materials research under a hot shop floor with cutting edge materials and a data logging laptop was interrupted with a happy Onam. Yes happy Oman I messaged back. Happy namo came another response. Sure he is I thought and got back to work. The day done; a cool Uber took me to an air-conditioned metro which took me to Chennai central.  Happy Onam the lady greeted to someone over the phone. That done her phone with a Jesus Saves as the DP buzzed, her tone was more than a tad respectful. What did you eat? Was the Avial OK? He is on a call, right? I will take a metro and come home. Not to worry. Ah. Ah. Sure. Thanks. Tomorrow is Avani Avittam? Oh yeah. Are we going to make payasam? Sure. The person next to me was juggling cultures and schedules. Unfettered by healthy diet, I waved out when ice-cream vendor passed by, cutlets, avoided cold dosas with rivers of chutney and dozed off. My school group buzzed. There was an argument between free speech loving American desis and anti-preached desis. Happy Raksha  bandhan and happy Avani Avittam said another thread. While these are well intentioned events, with the former supporting some interaction between genders when it was all frowned upon, while the latter is a brahmin male’s ritual committing to learning and piety, marked by the changing of sacred thread, to mark  the  retrieval of Vedas stolen by demons back to Brahma – however this tradition excludes women and men who are not brahmins by birth.  Hence the debate, to put it mildly.

The best interpretation of the Raksha Bandhan is that women are vulnerable, and the men protect them tying what is a platonic knot symbolised in the form of a thread. Who are they protected from? The nameless underworld? A frustrated lumpen? Or those who belong to any other? And why not the other way round. The men who are vulnerable to myriad pressures, including being robbed, mugged, cyber duped? I That only the males offer protection is a stereotype.

Avani Avittam is the day when Brahmin males change their sacred thread. A morning spent in gentle male bonding within the clan, with shlokas narrated, Ganesha propitiated, an hour spent cross legged in front of a smoky fire, verses narrated without comprehending the meaning.  The girls don’t get to partake, they can of course cook dishes to mark the event.  People from other castes are not a part of this ritual.   A tradition that is kept alive partly out of belief, and partly because other good traditions are under assault.  Well, others are not equipped to understand is the refrain.  The shlokas, even the more profound ones are not too complicated. If high school kids can solve differential equations and perform matrix inversions and multiplications they certainly will not blank out when asked to narrate the meaning of Gayatri Mantra. While these rituals are replete with meaning and symbolism, connecting us to the divine, exclusion is the only problem.

So here is a simple appeal to make all threads universal.

Switching to the corporate world, threads have become a buzz word. Especially a digital thread. In such a magically connected world, the digitised design process would interface with CAD drawings and on to production and on to production records and on to service records. The digital thread becomes the nerve Centre of organisation learning and memory. To lend complete meaning one needs to have a digital twin that connects changes to a component in service to how it got there in the first place, the manufacturing parameters, supplier heat numbers, quality records,and operating conditions including life limiting locations. Getting those threads connected is more that appending files, but getting to really understand material response to service conditions. Such a philosophy can be applied  to anything that is manufactured and put to use.   From implants to airfoils to batteries. A thread built on rigor. But like all engineering proclivities this such an approach tends to  be reductionist in nature, trying to simplify the complex. The unknowns are not dug further. But mashed under a probabilistic response. The focus has shifted more towards the digital thread and digital twin.  In some ways the systems response is like solving a multiple choice tough exam.  The toughest of the problems is left unsolved, while those that find traction are solved.   The corrosion condition that pushed the material to pit and crack gets ignored; the failure of a seal upstream in allowing the hotter gas flow to reach critical locations is ignored too.  The digital twin supports decision making for typical conditions while transients and upset events which are life limiting often get ignored.  But like a college kid who could ace the exam without knowing everything, initiatives like the digital twin continue to allow the organization to live the 80 – 20 rule without comprehending that when the bad 20% catches up one could be caught napping.

Therefore we engineers, have not quite gotten ourselves to say happy digital thread day..: today is Avani Avittam. Time to reboot the computers and data.  Partly because engineers on the ground, except for  the super ambitious are grounded. They are quite aware of the physics that is missing, in not being able to predict that corrosion fatigue failure, that fatigue interaction, that flutter induced damage event. With so many unknowns, the ones who are honest say, well the digital twin is great when the entire physics is nailed, but we need money to nail the entire physics.  However, the lure of a digital twin, that combines probabilistic algorithms with an 80% understanding of physics, to predict machine performance and failures, caught the upper leadership and drove a culture where the physics need not be completely understood.   The digital thread falls short of the ideal and needs to be further tuned.

Which gets us back to other threads in the society that bind and divide; Can all other societal threads be tuned too. To produce a twang that sounds inclusive

 

 

A full court press to reduce emissions.

Dr. K. Anand

 

Today, April 22nd is earth day.  The CO2 emissions level stands at 420.87 ppm.  It was 395 ppm a decade ago in 2013.  We are registering an annual increase of 2.5 ppm per year.  The median CO2 ppm for the scary 1.5 deg rise is 520 ppm - we are just 4 decades away that milestone if not sooner.  Power generation is the biggest contributor to emissions, accounting for more than 50% of green-house gas emissions in India.

 

Climate change, along with the urban heat island effects have pushed energy consumption to record levels  For example peak power demand has gone up by 50% in Tamil Nadu in less than a decade, and well before summer.  Despite the growing footprint of Renewables (RE), about 75% of the energy on tap comes from fossil fuel in India.  Given that wind energy is seasonal and feasible only in pockets, and solar energy is subject to variability in weather (smog, clouds, dust), this should come as no surprise.   With the country recovering from COVID the last two years have seen some of the highest offtake of coal in recent times.  Coal – freight trains now clog the tracks dispatching fuel to thermal power plants cranking at full capacity.   Given that the energy demand continues to be met through increased use of fossil fuels one needs to be honest in facing these facts and ask where the solution for the energy sector is, develop technologies and invest accordingly.

 

 

Fossil fuel-based power comprises of more than 75% of the delivered energy

Electricity sector in India - Wikipedia

An interesting question is can nature-based approaches such as afforestation and rapid increase in green cover provide a solution.  It would be interesting to take data from one state to explore this further.  Tamil nadu consumed forty-one crore units of power in one day on April 20^th according to The Hindu.  With 75% of the power coming from thermal power, this translates into thirty crore units of power from thermal power or close to fifty crore  Kg of coal burnt per day, resulting in 125 crore Kg or 1.25 million tons of CO2 in a day.  To sequester this back through forest-based solutions is a
daunting task.  .  Tamil Nadu’s standing forests of about 26000 sq km (20% of area) – six million acres would redress sixty million tons of CO2 or 60 days of emissions.  To sequester a year’s worth of emissions about 120000 sq.km of land area – or over 90% of the state needs to have green cover, which is impossible.   However, there are opportunities to mitigate this further, by converting lower carbon per hectare monoculture plantations to six hundred Tons / Hectare rain forests and sholas where possible, by regenerating mangroves across the coast, by converting barren coastal regions to dry evergreen forests such as those seen in Guindy and Point Calimere.  However one needs to be honest in acknowledging that these are mitigative steps and not the sole pathway to reach Nett Zero emissions.

 

A six hundred Tons / Hectare Shola Forest in Nilgiris

 

 

.   Clearly nature-based approaches are only part of the puzzle. One needs to redress emissions footprint for the different power generation modalities,  at source.  Potential solutions for include:

Technologies to Reduce Emissions from Power Generation by 5 to 30%:

 

·         More efficient thermal power. ultra super critical thermal for coal, coal gasification. And combined cycle gas turbines powered by syn-gas for reduced emissions even at higher cost.  This would reduce emissions from existing thermal power plants by about 20%

 

·         Combined cycle gas turbines at 64% efficiency as against 36% to 42% for new coal-based power plants.  This can reduce emissions by 30%

 

·         Carbon capture at an industrial scale.  While this would increase energy demand by 5 to 10%, all of CO2 in principle can be captured  - and could be part of a nett zero emissions play,

 

·         Thermal power augmented with biofuel – includes agro-residues, municipal waste.  Agro-waste is a renewable resource, and it contributes to reduced emissions to about 10 to 15% maximum.

 

 

Technologies for Zero Emissions

 

·         More renewables , offshore wind to address peak power demand in the evening. (5 to 10% of local energy demand)..  Of shore wind can generate up to three times  the energy per acre compared to on-shore installations

 

·         More Solar and wind energy,  rooftop solar and wind,  Irrigation pumps powered by solar contributing to zero emissions.

 

·         Nuclear.- despite risks this is a mature technology capable of delivering 24 x 7 power.  Counties such as France had shown clear thinking by resorting nuclear energy to meet 68% of its energy requirements through nuclear power.  Small nuclear power plants are an alternative that reduce risks of catastrophic exposure of population to radiation leaks should there be an accident.

 

·         Small Hydro  – these runs of the river installations amounting to less than a MW of power can harness energy from flowing streams. 

 

·         Agro-waste driven distributed power can unlock more revenue streams for farmers.  Crop waste, excreta from cattle could be used to generate either liquid fuel, methane, natural gas, or hydrogen to generate power, making farmers nett suppliers of energy.  Since any form of agro-waste or residue is a renewable resource these sources of energy are nett zero in emissions,

 

·         Green Hydrogen and ammonia – derived from renewable sources.

 

We have a plethora of technologies to reduce emissions.  Among these the only ones that are deployed at a mass scale accounting to a significant proportion of the energy mix are solar and wind energy.  The country requires a full court press – including technologies to reduce emissions from fossil fuel-based power, all renewable or Nett zero emissions energy sources, and nature-based solutions to sequester back greenhouse gases.

 

The country can clearly do more than what is being done now.  These tangible steps to maintain energy security while reducing emissions footprint could be the driver for future economic growth,

 

 

References

 

1              Electricity sector in India - Wikipedia

 

2.            Natural Resources Research (

---

 2019) https://doi.org/10.1007/s11053-019-095
TV Ramchandra et. Al. “Carbon Sequestration Potential of the Forest Ecosystems in the Western Ghats, a Global Biodiversity Hotspot”

 

 

 

 

 

 

India @75 - Setting the Agenda

 

When India attained independence in 1947, it was one of the poorest countries in the world.  Holding its diverse population together, with different religions, speaking in more than 20 different languages, and preventing mass famine and fatal epidemics was India’s main challenge.  However, thanks to its freedom movement, which brought together educated and visionary leaders and idealistic masses, the country retained a core dignity and promise which other newly independent nations strived for.  India became a natural leader of the developing world, forming the non-aligned movement which carved out a separate space for countries that did not want chose between the Soviet and USA blocks.  The country’s leadership worked hard to modernize India, creating public sector organizations that industrialized India, creating national labs for industrial, nuclear and space research, and technology universities that were world class.  While India made steady progress in major indicators – 60% increase in life expectancy from 1950 to 1990, a 300% increase in per capita GDP from 1960 to 1990, other developing nations leaped ahead, some close to joining the ranks of developed economies such as South Korea or Taiwan.  China while remaining under the rule of the Communist Party, opened its economy in waves, starting from 1979, and again in 1990s to now emerge as the world’s second largest economy.  Smaller nations such as Malaysia and Thailand embraced the manufacturing and services economy to grow out of poverty by the early 1980s.

 

India by contrast never quite had a plan.  The opposition was more interested in identity politics – mobilizing people along the lines of caste or religion.  Congress was stuck in scams and slogans of the past, till an impending economic collapse forced it to liberalize in 1991.  While the potential benefits was all too evident, when one considered nations like China, Korea, or Malaysia, neither the intellectuals nor the opposition had really signed up for the policy changes in 1991.  After a decade of moderate growth, India began to accelerate economically from the early 2000s, with benefits in the form of better amenities, airports, metros, malls, communication tools, higher wages available to many; more than 140 million people climbed out of poverty.  Even relatively poor states such as UP by now have about one in three homes with a two-wheeler.  Yet about 38 to 52% of the population is poor in states like UP, Bihar and MP, as defined by NiTI Ayog’s Multi-Dimensional Poverty Index (MDPI) in 2022.   When one examines other metrics such as infant and maternal mortality , % literacy, life expectancy, we continue to perform poorly as compared to neighbours such as Bangladesh and Sri Lanka, and not much better than several Sub-Saharan nations.  So the benefits of liberalization and economic growth have not been far reaching  - and India remains in several large pockets, poor and underdeveloped.  For many in the middle and upper middle class – about 30% of India, life has turned out to be better.  The amenities that one could afford now were way beyond reach or unavailable a generation ago, and this includes TVs, appliances, vehicles, smart phones, vacations, air travel. 

 

However there is work to be done, the roads tend to be dusty, potholed, with pockets of garbage strewn around.  24x7 water and power supply for many is a pipe-dream. Sanitation is poor in villages, with open gutters carrying sewage being the norm.   The railway transportation is way behind China and Europe in terms of speeds and comfort.   Pollution is a major issue across northern and eastern India, and impacts over 500 million people.  The society is unequal and stratified along religious and caste lines.  India is facing extreme weather events thanks to climate change and increased emissions.  And over the past 3 decades India had to face up to sponsored terror from one country and military intrusions from another.

The question is seventy-five years post-independence, can the country square up to these challenges and get its act together.  Do citizens of the country understand and feel the pain?  Do its citizens realize that the agenda for the country needs to be far more focused going forward compared to what it is being driven today?    So what should be on the agenda for the country?

There needs to be a quantum leap in the level of amenities that need to be available and within reach for its citizens – this includes roads, piped water, sanitation, primary health care, good schools, and housing.  India’s GDP is $3 trillion.  The country spending in the social sector is barely 10% of its GDP.  The resources required need to be an order of magnitude higher.  This cannot be done by the government on its own.  It needs to be a partnership with the private industry and NGOs, where it makes sense.  The government needs to spend more on human resources – teachers, anganwadi workers, asha workers, nurses, doctors to make a dent in education and health care.  Yet the country cannot print money – any strategy that does not consider macro-economic factors such as fiscal prudence would quickly put India and Sri Lanka of 2022 on par.  The resources required to make India a developed nation can come only from broad based economic growth, aided by a supportive government, a moderate and soft tax regime, a simplified bureaucracy, and innovative policies that direct economic growth and better wages towards the poor.  The last masterstroke was MNREGA.  The country cannot ride that horse forever.  It needs to drive business innovations and technologies where rural India derives more value from its food grain and horticultural produce, and find new opportunities from agro-waste, resulting in agrofuels and energy.  The county needs to democratize renewable energy and ensure that even poor households are able to sell power back to the local grids from their roof tops.

The citizens need to internalize and understand that it is only broad-based socio-economic growth that will help the country stand tall.  Yes, India’s unique cultural heritage and plurality makes the country special.  But if India’s culture gets mired in identity politics, its heritage would become a millstone.  To progress India needs to maintain a focused agenda which is stated below.

1.       The basics cannot be compromised, this includes maintaining fiscal prudence, strong defence, preserving its nature capital, and increased self-sufficiency especially for its basic needs – food, energy , transportation.

 

2.       8 to 10% GDP Growth.  A decade of 8 to 10% growth in GDP would result in the economy trebling in size which would provide the required resources to upgrade India’s infrastructure when it comes to roads, housing, healthcare, sanitation and water, and education to that of a middle-income country.  India grew at 8 to 10% GDP for nearly a decade from 2002 till 2011.  India must do this again. 

 

3.       New Jobs in Sustainability and Climate Change:  This would take investments, R&D and building capacity in current and emerging modes of renewable power and water resources.  The country needs to create skilled manpower to support renewable energy and decarbonization.  However mitigating climate change would also involve maintaining and augmenting the country’s natural capital.  Ecological restoration is required in arguably 10 to 15% of India’s landmass and this would require knowhow and participation of local communities.  Sustainability as an economic pillar could readily exceed 15% of India’s GDP and can cut across manufacturing, agricultural and services sectors   Sustainability should be treated as a key vertical for the country and provide employment across the spectrum, from  manual labourers to PhDs.

 

4.       Agriculture – throughput and value creation and addition:  India has made impressive gains in agriculture.  Techniques such as SRI have improved productivity of rice and sugarcane.  Mechanization compatible with small land holdings has emerged in several parts of the country which reduces input costs and improves productivity.  Drip irrigation is now commonly used to reduce water consumption.  Solar and wind powered pumps can improve energy and water security.  Cold storage, seamless and decentralised farm to retail shop connect can help.  Developing new pillars around biomass-based fuels specially for the ethanol blended fuels and energy would be vital.

 

5.       Current segments in full throttle:  India has a fairly mature services and manufacturing economy.  Its IT and financial sectors are booming.  Inflation and efficient taxation have reduced disposable income for most consumers.  India’s recovery will be consumption driven.  India’s taxation policies need to in tune with the imperatives of growth.  Once growth is kickstarted across the country, India’s coffers would automatically go up.  And this would enhance the ability of the government to make a more positive impact on the livelihoods and amenities enjoyed by the common man.

 

6.       A decade of peace:  it is a given that for any country with a history as long as that of India, there could have been historical injustices and violence suffered by different segments of the society.  But that is distant past.  India has signed up for a secular present and future where everyone is equal.  At least now, this should be the decade for Indians to live in amity, knowing that heart of heart very few countries provide the space and freedom to practise one’s cultural heritage and identity the way India does.   We as citizens of India need to watch out and ensure that the agenda is that socio economic growth, and not strife.  We have a President of the country who comes from the Adivasi community.  She cannot be a token leader. Just as the tiger, a flagship species represents India’s nature capital, so do Adivasis, in demonstrating how life could be led in coexistence.  Their aspirations and needs have to be met too,

 

India, the world’s 5^th largest economy is at a fork, never has the promise of prosperity for most been more within reach, nor has its vulnerabilities so sharply exposed. This is the time for India to stand up.  On the 75^th anniversary of our independence. 

The Manali Leh Meanderings

We just got back from an amazing, exhausting trip to the Manali-Ladakh region - endured AMS of some form, Priya was diagnosed with COvid after we returned, and now getting out of it,. Manasi had AMS (Acute mountain sickness for sure).

The logistics - We thought we would gracefully ascend from Manali to Leh - 7000 to 11000 ft by road and be all set, but about 6 hrs of that journey was at 15000 to 17500 ft.  Starkly beautiful - but enough to get you into AMS in-spite of the preventive medication and the 3 to 4 liters of water which each of us had - I was quite OK.  But oxygen levels for family ranged from 73 to 83 at 16500 ft and that had an impact.  We skipped other halts at 15000 feet and drove to Leh at 11400 ft and were all set.

The look and feel - compared to the early 2000's which was my first trip to Manali, one can clearly see signs of prosperity - tourism has had an impact But there is construction everywhere - roads 4 laned from Mandi to Manali, rocky faces blasted, tunnels bored, landslides as common as sink-holes in Bangalore  - can't imagine this being done to Western Ghats - the protection lobby is too strong here.  The microcosm which is India is still seen - a family in burkha enjoying dosas in a breakfast place near Chandigarh, a Gurudwara which is a universal halt, Hippies from Israel living a life of weed and austerity in Manali..  And the SUVs small and large that have colonized the mountains north of Manali - license plates from Kerala, karnataka, Tamil nadu, Maharashtra, Gujarat.. Interesting indeed.  Once one leaves Jispa - 11000 ft and continue to climb northwards - the traffic thins out - it is largely heavy duty Indian trucks - Leyland and Tata - multi-axled that manage 16 to 17000 feet braving the roads.  The dhabas enroute are a place for decent food, tea, even beds to sleep in - the rugged hospitality is so evident. Indians seem to be enjoying India in a way that was not quite common a decade or two ago.  The transition from Mandir to Monastery starts around Manali - by the time one reaches Lahaul and then on to Ladakh it is all Buddhism - a heritage which is lost to the vain unbridled commerce and uniformity in China.

Got a chance to visit many monasteries - masterpieces in terms of aesthetics, location, architecture and spiritual power perhaps.  But is it like the most intricate of pieces in Carnatic music - grasped by only a few - nodded off as must be good by the masses?  A Gurudwara that I visited surely has its mystic layers if one chooses to unpack it all - but in its form of practice it is so open and warm - interesting indeed to visit the patharwaala Gurudwara - a boulder that turned to sand when pushed towards Guru Nanak by a demon.

There is army everywhere once one enters the Ladakh valley - largely unobtrusive - no individual checks except for the RTOs. Among the sights and sounds - we visited the hall of fame museum in Leh - chronicling the various wars that the army had to fight - from 1947 to Kargil (2018-21 at Ladakh was yet to be featured).  Plenty of pride for sure - for the jawans who were hosting some of the show and tells - such as the Kargil recap - the enemy is Pakistan.  That there is a larger bear to the north has not quite sunk in.  Which is unfortunate - from two counts - all wars are unfortunate, and if an enemy to the west is synonymous with a group of people within India it is a big problem.  That said, defending the border in Himalayas is really arduous - and the conflicts over the last two decades are all too real.  China is too cynical a country to wage peace.  Pakistan and India will have an axe to grind for ever..  We are stuck with people from all parts of India defending these borders - the museum cafe was supposed to have Momos - there were Tamil soldiers who were manning the counters - sorry sir - Momos innum ready yaa illai - he replied, when I asked him in Tamil.

Ten minutes later we stop at a cute little restaurant.  The owner took the order and asked me to sit down while I waited for the Momos to be packed.  A group of young men and women were seated at the next table - a guitar being strummed while they sang.  The door opened and a group of women - some with head-scarfs,  others well dressed in western clothes - looked around and picked a table out in the open - my momos came.    Got into the car, went past the army cantonment to our very cute hotel.  Our taxi driver and friend Harnam was tipped handsomely - one of the best drivers I have seen - on road and off road - at the hotel a Mr. Abdul shook my hands and said he will drop us at the airport the next day.

A holiday was complete - In spite of our glorious treks - we had AMS.  The sights and sounds of Himalayas are too magnificent to be put in words.  A microcosm of India was enjoying the country and living in peace - while those protecting the borders do what they have to do to ensure that we remain this way.

Can we honour this in letter and spirit - respect and cherish what we have - and just live in peace.

I sign off with a quote from the Hall of Fame museum..

 "It is better to conquer yourself than to win a thousand battles. Then the victory is yours. It cannot be taken from you, not by angels or by demons, heaven or hell." The message has a very deep meaning and conveys one of the most important lessons for mankind.

 

India’s  Imperatives vs Immediacy of Actions

 

India’s economic independence, after several scattered attempts, came to fruition in 1991.  While the trigger was India’s plunging forex reserves and impending default with IMF, the malaise was clear for many.  India’s socio-economic policies locked the poor into poverty and stifled the middles class from bettering themselves and generating surpluses for the country which could in turn more opportunities for the poor.  1991 changed much of that.  After the initial shock in the form of a depreciated rupee, and a spike in interest rates, as well as austerity measures, the policies to stoke the private sector began to bear fruit.  India began to see GDP growth rates approach 6 to 7% per annum through the 1990s.  The market for cars grew from 1 lakh (100,000) per year in 1990 to 1 million in 2000 and to 3.6 million by 2012.  Similar explosive growth was seen in the two-wheeler industry.  With cheaper cell phones, greater employment opportunities in the formal and informal sectors, widening of the social net through programs like MNREGA, more than 140 million people grew out of poverty.  The traditional bugbears for the upper middle class in the form grungy airports, poor shopping options, dirty public transport systems became history, with even Tier 2 towns having airconditioned shopping malls, modernization of most airports by 2010, and functioning of metro in several cities by 2015.  The question that was being asked at the cusp of the new decade in 2010 was whether India could break free from poverty within a generation.  With Tata Motors offering the Nano for One lakh, it looked like India was going to deliver for all – the poor to find their way out of poverty, the aspirational classes who could  stretch their wallets a bit and get a car and for the upper middle classes too.  The Lokpal movement in 2011 took on corruption and brought in new political players.  While a new leader who had been making waves since 2002 from Gujarat, apparently shaking off the communal baggage assumed centre stage in 2014, with the promise of governance and a laser like focus on economic growth.  With the foundations laid in 1991 for economic growth, and the surge from the 2000’s with dividends form liberalization, and  socio-economic programs, and the promise of governance in 2014, India could take off emerging as a nation without poverty and run-away economic growth.

 

The truth is that the promise of 2014 remains just a promise.  India’s vehicle sales in 2021 has slid back to the levels seen in 2014 (18.5 million in 2014 to 26 million in 2019 and back to 18.5 million in 2021).  The textile consumption in India peaked in 2015 and has started to slide down again.  India’s per capita GDP after having increased by 300% between 2000 and 2010 ($443 to $1358), has increased by only 40% from 2010 to 2020 ($1358 to $1912).  With plummeting interest rates for savings and deposits, and an unavoidable surge in fuel prices, stagnating wages, and disruptions to the economy from 2018, and most notably since 2020 due to COVID, India is getting stuck.  India went through a slow-down in growth (we still grew at 5% and not decline) in 2012 and 2013.  When India was faced with a growth blip the entire media was focused on the growth slow down – decision paralysis became a watchword, and the government quickly tried remedy the situation, with notable results.  Poor economic growth translates into poor Human Development Indices.  The HDI of states such as UP, MP, Bihar remains below several Sub-Saharan African counties such as Kenya, Ghana, or Gabon, today in 2022.  If one were to view India today from the promise of 2010, when it seemed to have learnt how to show rapid economic growth between 2000 and 2010 and poised to fix its governance issues from 2014 from a leader who could get things done, the truth is that India has not lived up to its promise.  The disruption caused by COVID to livelihoods, income, poverty levels is barely captured.  There are pressing reasons to fix the economy and ensure that the tens of millions of Indians are climbing up the economic ladder every year while providing continued growth and security to the middle- and upper-income groups. 

 

India is faced with this situation while it is negotiating some pressing challenges – both internal and external.  India’s biggest internal challenge apart from poverty, poor HDI of several states and growing inequality is combating climate change.    Emissions from developed nations such as USA and Europe have already started to drop.  India’s emissions per capita has gone up by 150% between 1990 and 2018 and continues to rise.  India’s emissions per square kilometre is higher than USA.  India is losing old growth forests to mining, power projects and highways, and getting increasingly replaced by monoculture plantations.  While India has correctly embarked on an aggressive capacity addition in the form of renewable energy, barely 13% of its energy comes from wind and solar.  India’s reliance of thermal power is nearly 70% and comprises of ageing power plants with outdated carbon inefficient technologies.  India is faced with extreme rainfall events and scorching summers, milder winters which can adversely impact its citizens.  India’s neighbourhood continues to remain hostile.  While India is well equipped to deal with Pakistan, the borders with China remain contentious .  The disparity between China and India in terms of economic might has widened over the last 6 years, which China’s economy being nearly 6 times larger in size of India compared to four times over a decade ago.  As recent world events have shown, such a status quo is hardly advisable, and India needs to double down on economic growth.

 

Given the gravity of challenges facing India, one would think that the country and its populace are focused towards facing the future with a laser like focus.  Unfortunately, the political parties, significant sections of the country and the media are utterly distracted.  The excessive focus on religio-cultural issues has skewed the debate in several parts of the country.  Kerala and Karnataka are in the frontline combating climate change in the form of extreme weather events that have hit the state three years in a row.  Portions of northern Karnataka are significantly underdeveloped compared to southern Karnataka.  States like UP have remained largely agrarian.  As a result of new rules on how bovine cattle are handled, a seamless rural economy has ben impacted, while stray cattle roam the streets and raid the farms.  With a per-capita income which is one third of that of Maharashtra,  and limited investments in manufacturing and services, UP could remain poor for years to come unless policies change. 

 

The government is making earnest attempts to propel the economy forward.  Its tax collection machinery is very efficient.  When the crude prices were low, the government refrained from passing the benefits to the common man; rather it used the resources to drive infrastructure spending and keeping the safety net for the poor in place.  The government needs to realize that the large infrastructure projects are not yielding the results anticipated.  Large corporates have been the only ones to benefit.  Economic policies would need to be reconfigured.  Ways need to be found to leave more spending power in the hands of the common man – starting with better minimum support prices and covering more crops under the MSP scheme.  Agro-waste needs to be converted into fuel and energy while rewarding the farmers more handsomely.  By allowing ethanol blends to rise to 20% at the fuel pumps and ensuring at least 20% of agro-waste ends as thermal power, the nett emissions footprint can be improved significantly, while enhancing rural incomes significantly.    The country recognizes that at least 33% needs to be under green cover.  Ecological restoration of degraded forests needs to become a government program.  These are unchartered territories.  The government needs to enlist NGOs and academia in ecological restoration efforts.  With over 50,000 square kilometres of degraded forests, and at least another 65000 square kilometres of agricultural lands lying fallow, the opportunities to green are tremendous.  If this is handed over to the forest department and corporates a golden opportunity to convert this into an economic opportunity would be lost.  Greening the country could arguable employ at least 25 million people across the country and add to the economy.  Reducing the carbon footprint of the energy sector and greening the country could be the next major economic activity.  The surpluses generated would clearly boost GDP growth, improve India’s coffers, help it strengthen its defence and help it counter the might of its northern neighbour by standing up.

 

The question is are the citizens, politicians, and the media truly aware of the challenges and the opportunities ahead of the nation and the need for everyone to step up.  Or are we so distracted that we are only focused on the divisions that we have created in the country.

 

Can restoration of Eco-Systems become a fourth pillar in our economy

 

Restoration of Eco-Systems a fourth pillar in our economy
 – A National Perspective

 

We know by now that zoonotic diseases such as COVID 19 can take a heavy toll on human lives and economic activity.  Living in crowded cities, commuting in trains and buses, working in offices and factories now come in with a considerable element of risk.  But urban India is the engine of economic growth, the economic surplus that is generated from the urban middle class, generates demand and work across India.  While the privileged in urban India are adapting to Covid, the quest for livelihood remains the central challenge that India needs to face as it strives to improve standards of living for its citizens.  While the government and the private sector are providing jobs through agriculture, manufacturing and services, there is a fourth pillar which is barely being tapped today.  This is Ecosystem Restoration both as a means to secure healthy livelihoods and as an important investment for a sustainable future.  Restoration of eco-systems that clean up water bodies, create urban green spaces, bring abandoned quarries and mines back to life, restore degraded forests and wilflife corridor, reclaim shola-grass lands and evergreen forests from exotic plantation forests.

 

So, what does eco-system restoration entail?  How much does it cost per acre?  What are the most opportune / important areas of restoration one needs to focus on?  And can this really become a major economic pillar?

 

We know that eco-systems when left alone reach their climax stable state – such as shola-grassland systems in upper western ghats, evergreen forests in Silent Valley and Arunachal Pradesh, the moist-deciduous forest grassland complex in Kanha/Bandhavgarh.  But when the rate of human exploitation exceeds nature’s ability to repair itself degradation is set in motion.  Sometimes landscapes with heavy soil compaction, topsoil erosion, barren patches can take generations to recover.  But judicious human interventions to augment moisture retention through trenches, saucers, stone overflows for assisted natural regeneration, check dams, and ponds to allow for larger scale water percolation and needs for wildlife, along with seed broadcasting and seedling plantation to address species imbalance can turn the tide.  If the landscape is ridden with invasives such as Lantana Camara or Juli-flora, they need to be removed carefully and selectively to ensure that native vegetation is undisturbed, and dormant invasive seed bank is not exposed or activated.  Our efforts in Lokkere Reserve Forest – a 2000 acre degraded forest adjacent to Bandipur (www.Junglescapes.org), in a rain shadow belt gives me the confidence that restoration can work, and once we place the landscape in a trajectory where natural cycles take over (microbes, nurtients, moisture) multistory vegetation will come back abetted by native wildlife.

 

What resources does it take?  Not more than Rs 10,000 to Rs20,000 an acre, sometimes even lower.  And this is spread over a 3-to-5-year period and supports about 50 to 70 families full time for nearly a decade’.  These are healthy occupations – which leverage their knowledge of the lay of the land, which bank on their expertise and knowhow and local decision making.  We have seen that the net result is a restored eco-system, and pride within the local communities that they created a home for the wildlife.  The relationship changes from one of exploitation of nature to custodianship.

 

Which brings us to next question – what are the opportune areas for restoration?  In urban spaces, having a cleaner lake has a multiplier effect on health and sanitation.  Closer to cities, where hill sides have been ravaged by quarrying restoring quarries through topsoil augmentation, seed broadcasting and assisted natural regeneration can bring positive changes to the water table, and soil stability.  Our country has over 50 Project Tiger Reserves – being protected regions they typically have healthy ecosystems – though invasives have become a major issue in some forests.  But typically, adjacent to tiger reserves there are reserve forests – such as Lokkere Reserve Forest and Heggaewadi block next to Bandipur, Segur plateau next to Mudumalai, Reserve forests betweeen Sariska and Ranthambore, reserve forests and corridors that connect Pench and Kanha, the list is long.  But as we bring back the wildlife population, our tiger reserves are reaching their carrying capacity.  Strengthening reserve forests that connect to tiger reserves must be of the highest priority.  With 65000 square kilometers of tiger reserves, and a targeted 35000 sqkm of reserve forests that are contiguous to tiger reserves, restoration in such belts can have a multiplier effect for both wildlife and livelihoods in such remote areas.

 

A second priority area needs to be the watersheds of rain fed rivers.  The shola-grassland forests and dense evergreen/moist deciduous forests feed all the major peninsular rivers in India.  The Narmada – Tapti and Mahanadi rivers are completely dependent on forests in Vindhya’s and Sapura’s, and the Eastern Ghats.  An immediate requirement is to bring back native forests instead of exotic plantation forests in Nilgiris, Palani hills, and the Malnad – Sirsi belt in Karnataka.  This is a harder task.  Exotic mature plantations have to give way to native forests.  The native seedbank is largely absent in hundreds of square kilometers.   The methodology for restoration is not clear or known. We have to learn through action.  But if we succeed, we can improve rainwater harvesting, improve capture of moisture from clouds that waft by, and augment runoffs by 20%, and make a huge positive dent on carbon capture.  This will entail about 20% of western ghats – an area of 10,000 sq.km. at least.

 

We talked about restoration providing alternative livelihoods for local communities.  We talked about scale – more than 40,000 sq.km or nearly 10 million acres that needs to be restored.  At 20000 rupees an acre, restoring 25% of our degraded forests becomes a Rs 20000 crore economy (about $3 billion), directly spent in implementation of restoration activities on the ground every year.  This will require more than local communities pitching in.  We would need NGOs or local organizations to plan and work with stakeholders, academics to train the next generation of students and researchers, we need an expanded forest department which would have to work more closely with local communities to restore, rather than just protect current forests.   And if we add water bodies in urban areas, quarries to cater to the construction industry, mined areas, we are creating at least a Rs 60000 crore ($10 billion) restoration pillar which starts to look like the consumer durables sector in scale.  I am bringing in these figures, only to highlight the employment potential this sector brings.  The benefits are of course in the carbon we sequester, the eco-system services it provides, in the form of drinking water for urban cities, irrigation needs for the farms in the plains.  And the wildlife that find a home, and the human wildlife conflicts that are avoided in the process.

 

In India this opportunity has largely gone untapped.  The conservation space is dominated by iconic figures who have worked against all odds to save our keystone species from extinction.  The government has stepped in to provide the much-required legal protection for the existing protected areas to thrive. While India is congratulating itself in saving itself from the brink of species extinction, the fact is that the work has barely begun.  Conservation organizations, corporate donors, the ministries that allocate funds need to wake up to a Rs 60,000 crore socio-economic segment – with figures stated very conservatively – that needs to be created and sustained.  Almost in tune with the United Nations declaration that 2021-30 is the decade of ecological restoration.