Director’s Desk (2013-14)

I am happy to present the Annual Report of the academic activities of the Institute for the year 2013-14.

The Institute takes pride in its research agenda that includes understanding of local knowledge, politics, economics, culture, organisations and development of India particularly in Uttar Pradesh and neighbouring states. This year the faculty completed 2 research projects and 10 were in progress, published 2 books, 14 articles in refereed journals, 9 articles in edited books and 7 book reviews. Besides, 24 research papers were read in various seminars. The project funding came from various organisations including the Indian Council of Social Science Research, the National Thermal Power Corporation, Ministry of Human Resource Development, Ministry of Culture, Government of India, the Government of Uttar Pradesh and the Ford Foundation. The Institute also provided small amounts of seed money for undertaking research to its faculty. Four major seminars was organised this year.

This year, the highlight of our publications is two books. The first is by Professor U. Kalpagam whose many years of research has been compiled in the monograph Rule by Numbers: Govermentality in Colonial India. The monograph offers an original perspectives on the construction of the colonial state and colonial power in the framework of governmentality and draws implications for the postcolonial nation-state in the contemporary period. The book specially focuses on the production of statistical knowledge as part of colonial governance. Commentators have praised this work as a valuable subject to the subject of governmentality and biopolitics in colonial India; and a fascinating account of the formation of the British colonial state and an administration producing modern scientific discourses.

The second, nearer home, is book by Badri Narayan Kanshiram: Leader of the Dalits. The book draws on mydrid oral and written sources, Badri Narayan shows how Kanshiram mobilized dalits with his homespun idiom, cycle rallies and, uniquely the use of local folk heroes and myths, rousing their self-respect, and how he struck opportunistic alliances with higher-caste parties to seize power for dalits. It also describes the extraordinary relationship with Mayawati, right until his death, and the role she has played in fulfilling his vision, during and after his lifetime. The book has been extensively reviewed and has received accolades from both the academic and popular writing reviewers: Describing the books as a rich biography of Kanshiram, the reviewer recalls Kanshiram who boasted “Ambedkar collected books, I gathered people”. Already, a number of translations in other Indian languages are being proposed.

A third book “Agrarian Change and Small Farmers: Super Markets, Viability and Food Policy” edited by K. N. Bhatt and Pradeep Bhargava explores alternative ways of addressing issues concerning marginal and small farmers who cultivates 44 per cent of operated land in India constitutes 85 per cent of total holdings. There are 15 contributors in the study.

A number of other faculty members are working on mogographs on interesting themes like Development, Child labour, Stone breakers, OBC politics, Social movements, etc. all based on intensive field work over the years.

The Institute research is now focusing on the following three areas: Economic and Social Policies and strategies wherein the major concerns include agrarian structure, issues related to land, labour and employment; environment, disaster , poverty and climatic change; food security ; development related displacement and most importantly institutions and development. Social policy concerns include population growth and resource constraints, which are of utmost importance to the most densely populated state of Uttar Pradesh; problem associated with ageing; intergenerational transmission of advantages and disadvantages of education, health and stamina; the inter-relationship of under nutrition , health and eco-systems; enlarging  human choices: securing freedom, well-being and dignity for every human being; and gender and development issues. Culture, Politics and Society: Concept of power, popular cultures , memory and past, orality and printed knowledge of Dalit,  subaltern and other marginalised communities, local knowledge, structures and forms of subaltern cultural consciousness and linkage between cultural resources of the communities and process of development. Newly emerging public cultures, new turns in religious practices, mobile communities and moving images in globalised world, diasporic cultures, various forms of identity politics, cinema and media and relationship between politics, culture and state in colonial and contemporary India. Explorations of alternative public sphere, dissenting voices, social and political literature s, political of representations and emancipator and syncretic cultural forms. Democratic Processes and Institutions: concept of justice in democratic processes, relationship between social justice  and marginalities, govermentality,  new modes of participatory governance, popular aspirations and new social movements, formation of civil societies, state, power and citizenship and public sphere as space of democratic deliberations of post colonial Indian society. Issues of human suffering, forced displacement and migration, human rights and women dignity in contemporary globalisation induced developmental democracy. Exploring democratic processes at work, in different contexts, at different levels and their consequents interplays, understanding inclusionary and exclusionary politics with respect to ethnic and religious identities, changing contours of domestic politics under the influence of international forces.

There are 30 doctoral students in the Institute, two of whom submitted their dissertations this year. All MBA Rural Development students found placement in various developmental and micro finance institutions in the country.

The year 2013-14 witnessed the sad demise of Professor G. K. Chadha, the President of the Board of Governors, an institution builder and left his valuable foot prints behind. The Institute also mourned the death of Dr. Kripa Shankar an erstwhile faculty member of the institute and a grassroot intellectual. The Institute shall remain indebted to him for all times.

The Institute has received incessant academic and logistical support from the authorities of the University of Allahabad, from the President and all members of the Board of Governors to whom we reach out for advice from time to time. I am indeed thankful to all.

 

Director’s Report (2011-12)

 

I am happy to present the Annual Report of the academic activities of the Institute for the year 2011-12. 

The Institute continues to follow its research agenda including understanding local knowledge, politics, economics, culture, organisations and development in Uttar Pradesh and neighbouring states. This year the faculty completed 5 research projects and 13 were in progress, published two books, 11 articles in refereed journals, 11 articles in edited books and 2 book reviews. Besides, 11 research papers were read in various seminars. The project funding came from various organisations including the Indian Council of Social Science Research, the National Thermal Power Corporation, Ministry of Human Resource Development, Ministry of Culture, Government of India, the Government of Uttar Pradesh, the Ford Foundation, the SOS and the National Education Group. The Institute also provided small amounts of seed money for undertaking research to its faculty. Four major Seminars were also organised this year.

This year is important for research on women from diverse perspectives. Three important studies happened in this period. The first is a compilation of essays on multiple struggles of women published as a book, Second, an ongoing study on abuse of violence as a tool in contemporary politics shows how overt violence and intimidation have come to play a regular, even systemic role in public life in general and politics in particular in UP. The third study shows how marginalised women mothered Self Help Groups for betterment of their children and their own self and identity through a family assistance programme of the SOS. This study also shows how cash transfers work for the family but they need to be carefully planned and monitored. The three studies are briefly described below.

Women in India: Contemporary Concerns edited by U Kalpagam deals with contemporary concerns and experiences of women in India. The book comprises of essays by eminent authors published in various issues of Nivedini. They converge in the interdisciplinary terrain of Women's Studies, examining the ways in which women have negotiated and challenged structures of power through the Women's Movement which is also undergoing shifts in perspectives in recent times. The concerns include dalit women's struggles, muslim women's negotiation within their communities for greater equality, the role of state and its commitment to gender, the changing life styles, roles and status of the pastoral women in the Himalayan region, and the negotiations for autonomy and agency in family life in the works of feminist fiction which is one repository of cultural imagination that indicates alternate life worlds. Issues of feminist epistemology and pedagogical concerns of Women's Studies in India are also highlighted.

An ongoing study, Three Women Three Stories: Violence and political process in Uttar Pradesh (1989-2009) by Badri Narayan investigates the role of the state and examines the abuse of violence as a tool of contemporary politics through three case studies of three dalit women Kuchchidevi, Shivpatia and Mayawati who were vicitimised at different points of time. So far, the findings suggest that overt violence and intimidation have come to play a regular, even systemic role in public life in general and politics in particular,  such incidents are used by political parties for their political leverage without caring for the fate of the victims, the bodies of dalit women, thrice discriminated under caste, class and patriarchy become site of violence and are exploited also by other women belonging to political parties who try to obtain political leverage from the victims under the pretext of helping and supporting them. The study shall also examine the political implications of these three cases and how various agencies of the state like the administration, police and judiciary and other agencies like NGOs, political leaders etc., used these incidents for their own benefit.

Mother Courage and her Children: An Assessment of the Family Strengthening Programme in Varanasi by Pradeep Bhargava is a report submitted to the SOS, the funding agency. The SOS Village is known for providing a loving home for every child in need. In the neighbourhood of the SOS Village, the children are also deprived of basic necessities. To meet these SOS initiated the Family Strengthening Programme in Varanasi. The purpose of the Family Strengthening Programme is to enable children who are at risk of losing the care of their family to grow within a caring family environment. To achieve this work is undertaken directly with families and communities to empower them to effectively protect and care for their children, in cooperation with local authorities and other service providers.

It was found that like mothers in the SOS, the co-workers and animators have mothered the Self Help Groups of biological mothers of targeted children and the team leader fathered them. Individual needs of each child, mother and even father of FSP families have been identified and attempts made to address these. Cash transfers through SHGs have been made in a manner that SHGs and families own it (and not the SOS co-workers) and amounts are used for the identified purpose. Children are now more healthy and happy. The most important transformation achieved has been of the mothers of targeted children. A persona non-grata in her family, work place, community or in dealing with the State, has emerged as an extremely powerful woman and has become the fulcrum of the programme. She negotiated for space in each place not only for the secure livelihood of the family but for her children, supporting her girl child to be educated, though it means more work for her at home as children study. At work place she has demanded due wages for her work and fought against child molestation in the school. The Mother Courage with all her self esteem, honour and dignity has arrived and would ensure the same in her children. She loves them and she beats them but she works for them. They are her hope. Ensuring two meals a day is a War for her, which she has learned to fight with courage.  There is a lot that the planners could learn from this small experiment.

Yet another contribution of the Institute has been the book Rethiniking Villages edited by Bhaskar Majumder and Badri Narayan, an outcome of a seminar held in 2004. The book claims that people in villages are becoming more receptive to modernisation. The image of the village republics has been effectively erased and people are willing to be a part of Darwinism to achieve the commanding height of the society as their urban counterparts. The book suggests that the Indian village is caught in a whirlpool of change whose substance and direction are yet to be clear.

S K Pant completed three projects, namely, 5% Sample Checking of DISE Data of Varanasi and Khusinagar Districts of U. P., External Evaluation of Mid Day Meal in 10 Districts of Uttar Pradesh, External Evaluation of Resource Centre for Adult & Continuing Education (State Resource Centre) BHOPAL and Indore, M.P. The findings are of great relevance to Uttar Pradesh. It was encouraging to find that the DISE data matched with sample survey data on a large numbers of parameters pertaining to school information. However in some few indicators like establishment year of schools, the position of class rooms in the schools, the level of variation was quite large. The overall level of supervision and monitoring was not high and quite a few of the sample schools also suffered from high incidence of absenteeism. Similarly most of the Principals/Head teachers had remained untrained, which was in contravention to SSA guidelines.

The mid day meal study found that the programme was a success in ensuring the functionality of the programme, following the guidelines regarding display of MDM menu, quality and quantity of meals, providing separate kitchen shed, providing gender sensitization in the recruitment of cooks, utensils for cooking, provision of potable water for cooking of meals in an overwhelming proportion of schools. However, in other aspects like organizing health check-up camps or maintaining health register/health cards, distribution of micro-nutrients, or even invoking the community participation and supervision etc., it had not met with success as was expected of it.

 

Sunit Singh studied Value Chain of Rice in India, in collaboration with IFPRI. This study was part of a larger research study that addressed three major questions relating to domestic staple food value chains in Asia: (1) Are staples value chains transforming structurally? (2) Is the conduct of staples value chains’ actors transforming? (3) Is the performance of staples value chains leading to the inclusion of small-scale farmers, small-scale midstream actors, and workers, and (all else being equal) to lower food costs for consumers? The results of the study have been incorporated in a volume published by IFPRI.

The faculty engaging in rather long term projects on issues relating to food sovereignty, tribal leadership, ageing, sufi shrines and various NTPC projects continued to work in this year as well. We look forward to promising publications from them.

The Institute has received incessant academic and logistical support from the authorities of the University of Allahabad, from the President and all members of the Board of Governors to whom we reach out for advice from time to time. I am indeed thankful to all.

 

Director’s Report (2010-11)

 

I am happy to present the Annual Report of the academic activities of the Institute for the year 2010-11. 

This year the focus of Institute’s research and activities has been exploration of the local and the marginal spheres. Understanding local knowledge, politics, culture, organisations and development, hitherto overlooked by mainstream discourse, is at the core of our research of the women, dalits, tribals, displaced and other vulnerable peoples. Based on these themes the faculty authored seven books and 58 research papers this year, of which 12 papers were presented in seminars abroad. Doctoral students also  authored 16 papers. Projects on similar themes were completed and are on going. The project funding has come from various organisations including the Indian Council of Social Science Research, the National Thermal Power Corporation, Ministry of Human Resource Development, Ministry of Culture, Government of India, the Government of Uttar Pradesh, the Unicef, the Ford Foundation, and the National Education Group. The Institute also provides small amounts of seed money for undertaking research to its faculty. Five major Seminars were also organised this year.

The Dalit Resource Centre of the Institute rightly takes pride in presenting The Making of a Dalit Public in North India, unfolding the multiple, suppressed layers of Dalit consciousness and its mobilisation in vibrant ethnographic detail, and is a commentary of contemporary Indian politics. Women and gender concerns are an ongoing theme of research of the Institute and is peer reviewed and vastly commented on. In the series Gender and Development in India: Current Issues, explores among other themes multiple meanings of women’s empowerment and their participation in decentralized democratic governance, impact of ICTs on women in the informal sector.  Roots and Wings: Reinforcing Sanitation and Hygiene Education in Schools, is an outcome of a research project on sanitation education in schools. It analyses how factors like child cabinet, nodal teachers and reinforcement of hygiene education helped in the success of the School Sanitation and Hygiene Education (SSHE) of the UNICEF in ten districts of the state of UP. Housing on the Hills in India draws attention to how addressing adequacy of living space per person, quality and durability of houses, approach roads, water supply system, electricity, fuel, sanitation and public space provide security to rural masses and discourages forced migration of people. Rethinking Villages is a collection of articles on how modernity and homogenisation of villages has erased the image of village republics and underlines the importance of village for collective action. Kahe Gaile Bides: Why do you go Overseas is a tragic presentation of Bhojpuri migration since the 1870s and contemporary culture in Uttar Pradesh, Suriname and the Netherlands. The book is a collective effort of scholars of our Institute, and from Suriname and the Netherlands. 1857 Ka Mahasangram: Vaikalpik Itihaas Ki Or  is also a collective effort to bring fore the travails of a society of the period. In sum, the books are a representative of the research agenda of the local and marginal spheres.

This repository of knowledge created by the Institute is not only recognised by the peers, it is used by the state, political functionaries and peoples’ movements. At the beginning of the decade of 2010, we celebrate the above publications and promise a number of monographs in coming years from reputed publishers. Our interdisciplinary research has helped build the MPhil Programme in Development Studies of the Institute, presently under consideration of the Academic Council of the University of Allahabad. This shall be a vibrant inter disciplinary doctoral programme in social sciences. During the year, research projects were completed and are ongoing. These projects cover diverse areas in fulfillment of the objectives of the Institute. We present an overview of the projects.

 

Challenging Development 

A research on children in conflict situations challenged a state centric paradigm of Development: exploiting natural resources with violence and homogenizing praxis of education and knowledge. Children live in trauma in naxal affected areas of Chattisgarh and are forcibly alienated from their natural habitat. The state and civil society responses have been to alienate them further and regiment their lives, attempting to mainstream them.

 

An ongoing study of food sovereignty and rights based programmes in naxal affected districts of Chattisgarh documents the processes of making the community Self-Sufficient in food, form Self Help Groups and exercise rights over forest to produce, ensure 100 days labour in employment programme a ensure function of public distribution system.

 

The inevitability of capitalism as the only path of Development is alos being challenged in an on-going study that compares Gandhiji’s writings on economy, society and non-violence with the Marxist, liberal and neo-liberal ideas of Development. In a similar vein, a research on Rehabilitation and Resettlement of a power project affected persons recommends not merely material compensation but for ensuring a life with dignity and cultural identity and accordingly advocates for restoring their habitat including common prosperities and social relations. This perhaps, is difficult for in-migrant workers into the periphery of Allahabad to work in brick-kilns, known for bonded exploitative labour. Distanced from their habitat, the floating workers are forced into vulnerable situations where state institutions remain unresponsive.

 

Another study documents the changing role of adivasi leadership before and after independence. In the post-independence period protest movements led by adivasis themselves have a character different from led by non-adivasis. The movements have challenged dispossession of traditional livelihoods, opening of new mines, construction of big dawns as well as involved in national campaigns on right to food, education, nutrition and work.

 

 

Development and Institutions 

Development fostered its own institutions and have decried traditional local institutions and have taken pride in substituting them with modern/colonial institutions. A Social Watch: judiciary in Uttar Pradesh project points out that there are 6.35 million cases pending in various courts in the state and these amounted to 25 per cent of all cases. The cost and time involved in seeking justice is beyond the means of many. This was not so in the post when recourse to nyay panchayats was possible.

 

Weak institutional environment in stone-mining sector has ensured exploitation, debt bondages, human trafficking, and succumbing to nation involved in large scale illegal mining. This is a nation-wide phenomenon. Action Research documents the processes through which a fun Self Help Groups of stone-breakers low leased mining areas and made a small dent in the mafia.

 

A project on agri services in Uttar Pradesh for inclusive rural growth in collaboration with IFPRI shows that cooperative society and government stores have a strong bias towards medium and a large farmers and small farmers get a very small share of modern inputs be they seeds, fertilisers, pesticides or credit and have to settle with private traders who invariably supply poor quality inputs at a higher price – Besides the reach of government extension services is minimal and is being substituted by private companies and Rural Business Hubs.

 

 

Development and Technology: Two Perspectives 

A project on ICT among working women shows that mobile phones have brought increased capabilities and functioning among poor working women in the informal sector, reduced their transaction costs, increased communication and social life, leading to increased trust and social capital.

 

On the other hand, a project on encroachment of surface water bodies in Bundelkhand shows that a beginning of this phenomenon could partly be attributed to the state driven technology of handpums to provide safe drinking water. This led to individuration of the society to the extent that they not only lost the collective spirit of maintaining the surface water bodies but also started encroaching these leading to ecological disaster.

 

 

Perspectives of cultures based on local narratives 

Development and colonialism in many ways rejected our traditional systems of medicine and hence the knowledge systems around it. A study of folk medicine in urban setting focuses on vending and healing practices of road side healers in Allahabad as well as their links with Ayurveda and Siddha medicine. The study attempts to understand the cultural context in terms of culture bound definitions of illness and acceptance of this healing practice. It will further link the same to growing popularity of Ayurveda all over the world.

In a study of the aged populations it is found that even the aged, rather being alienated are actively involved in the making of culture, lifestyle changes ushered by globalization have resulted in changing attitudes towards the aged. Abandonment of aged has become a problem in the lower middle class but not as much among the poor. Attempts are made to mobilize elders into social networks.

A survey of Tsunami affected women indentifies the need for appropriate institutions and intervention that could empower women while relief of rehabilitation is provided. This would require addressing the pateriouchal system and gender mainstreaming of disaster reduction strategies.

 

Dalits

Search for contemporary dalit political language and mobilization for equality is sought in socio – cultural roots of dalit life. Studies are undertaken of innovative processes of cultural production, reproduction of circulation among marginalized communities and their roles in the making of subversive socio-political consciousness of the dalit everyday life culture. Sects like Kabirpanth, Ravidas Panth, formation of cultural notices of justice.

In this manner, the research in the Institute challenges, in a number of ways, the existing paradigms of Development and meta-narratives; creates new knowledge about such communities and the ‘local’, which generally receive less attention among researchers; identifies victims of Development and suggests measures for their amelioration; and finds gaps in Development processes to be filled-in. The Institute  celebrates the diversity of thought, ideas and expression: from the most materialistic to the transcendental from ensuring food with dignity to displaced populations of formation of community around Sufi Shrines leading it to a realm of transcending their immediacy) and from neo-classical liberal, neo-liberal to sub-altern or post-coloniality or just free thinkers.

The Institute has received incessant academic and logistical support from the authorities of the University of Allahabad, from the President and all members of the Board of Governors to whom we reach out for advice from time to time. I am indeed thankful to all.

 

Director’s Desk (2009-10)

 

I am happy to present the Annual Report of the G B Pant Social Science Institute year 2009-10. 

Our research agenda focuses on the study of socio-cultural-economic realities of Uttar Pradesh. The research extends into the changing scenario of India and a de-territorialized global socio cultural world. One of the thematic areas of research emerging in the Institute is around various kinds of marginalities produced by the traditional structures and the globalizing world.

Mariginality in its diverse perspectives is an underlying theme of many researches in the Institute. The poetics of marginality, motivated by the dalits, the tribals, the way side vendors, some in the image of the outlaw or of the primitive, prowl on the confines of a docile frightened order. Tracing social cultural roots of deprivation and exclusion, the research has documented creation of a new political language and subversive socio-political consciousness in the everyday dalit life through cultural production, reproduction and circulation. Dalit sect followings lead to formation of cultural notions of social justice within marginalized communities and such new emerging faiths inform and sustain their everyday struggle against social, cultural and political inclusion.

Popular forms of religiosity and marginality manifest in poetry of Sufi shrines. This is being explored in a project to explore the syncretic heritage of our society. Sufism once popular in urban centres and in the field of mass media is not the only Sufism but a sub-terrarium flow where a vast population gathers to express its pain and grievances and celebrates both success and failure in life. Unlike China the rate of suicide and the number of psychiatrists is lower in India and this is being looked at, in an ongoing work through the prism of this modernity debate. Similar questions, but not the same, are being addressed in a research on folk medicines in an urban setting based on the wayside hakeems sitting in tents.

Yet another group at the margins is that of the tribals. A research on their electoral representation predicted Congress victories in ST reserved Constituencies, which came to be true. In most States, according to him the Congress has a traditional vote bank, which has not changed.

Research on marginalities has also focused on state induced marginalization through displacement through land acquisition by thermal power projects: documenting the loss of livelihood, the processes of landlessness, loneliness, joblessness, food insecurity, social disintegration, vulnerability, BPL card being font into disuse, de-schooling of children and loss of identity.  The research then goes on to devise ways to reduce such vulnerabilities created by processes of marginalization.

Other areas of interest in marginalization include ageing in metropolis, epistemology, pedagogy and politics of women studies; and ICT and women; and discrimination of muslims in labour market.

Devising means to address economic deprivation and marginalization has been an old theme of research at the Institute. Research for an agency helped it design a multi-input area development programme in such clusters in the state of Uttar Pradesh, which are among the poorest districts in the state, with a proportionately higher concentration of marginalized communities, including minority communities; have low development indicators, which also indicate significant development potential. The report suggested working with flood affected communities simultaneously on (i) Understand peoples systems of recovery from floods and their knowledge base and help them build a resilient system against meeting floods; (ii) strengthening livelihoods by developing diverse farming systems, and undertaking nonfarm activities with women; and ensuring credit needs for both farm and non-farm; and (iii) addressing women’s health, RCH practices and the social practice of early marriages and consummation. The Project underlined the necessity for understanding multiple constraints before suggesting a development intervention.

The research on Sarv Shikhsa Abhiyan contributes to policy at the National and State level in one of the most educationally backward States in India. The overall results of large scale survey indicate that the educational environment in the State is changing in the State of U.P.: where there were no schools, there are schools, children come to school; girls are encouraged to come to school; and             teachers have been appointed and can be seen in schools. The scale of operation is very large that ensuring quality is a big challenge, the report finds out. Measures for improvement suggest quality of learning requires more sustained efforts and monitoring by CRC and BRCs which remain weak; and there needs to be convergence of programmes like health check up and text book distributions.

Two books got published this year. The first is an edited collection of articles: "Consumers Consumerism and Consumer Protection". The book published in association with the IIPA, has helped advance the consumer movement in the country. The second Political Economy of Public Distribution System in India reviews the public distribution system and the leakages therein from its procurement from farmers to distribution to the beneficiaries from the Fair Price Shops. It also analyses the role of Pachayati Raj Institutions in ensuring food security of the poor. The book is an outcome of a research supported by the Planning Commission of India.

A collaborative project with International Food Policy Research Institute on Impact of Rural Services hubs, Business Catalysts for Rural Competiveness and Inclusiveness, A Study of Value Chain of Potato and Rice in India found five emerging trends that are affecting the vegetable marketing in significant manner in the state:  modern organized retail chains supermarkets are making inroads in the vegetable trade; the private sector has come up in a big way in the vegetable (potato) sub-sector through Cold Stores, a new breed of entrepreneur/buyer farmers has emerged who have gained the skills to access to market information using information technology services, demand for organically produced green vegetable is increasing among educated and health conscious urban consumers. Although a very small quantity of vegetables is being commercially processed, it is growing with slow pace in the state. It requires efficient post-harvest handling for competitive value additions. The logistics solutions services are expanding to meet this requirement with multinational partnerships.

This year the Institute organized the Annual Conference of Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand  Economic Association in collaboration with Department of Economics, University of Allahabad. In their collaboration, we also organized a national Seminar on Nrega: Recent Evidence, Unresolved Issues and Possible Intervention. In addition, the Institute organized a National Seminar on "Land Reforms, Land Acquisition and their Impact on Livelihood Security of Rural People" and a Development Professional Meet on Managing Agri-Business Development Challenges and Options. The Institute also organized its much sought after Tenth Computer Application Course in Social Sciences.

The doctoral students are pursuing work in diverse areas such as future markets and the macro economy, an anthropological study on reproductive health, forced migration, micro finance, negative externalities of polluting industries, land size differential and productivity. The MBA RD students found placements in leading organizations of rural development.

The Institute shall continue to respond to various kinds of challenges posed in contemporary society. It could further address economic and social concerns of marginal groups and regions in Uttar Pradesh, new forms of marginalities created by the state, and means that the state and civil society could adopt to address these. These concerns are reflected in our research, teaching and advocacy. Our forthcoming M.Phil Programme in Development Studies traces the critical genealogy of development and critiques the homogenous understanding of the discipline and addresses the diversities in the third world societies. In this manner, the faculty is working towards furthering the objectives of the Institute: building a corpus of knowledge in social sciences, understanding the society in Uttar Pradesh and neighbouring regions, and teaching in social sciences as well as forging collaborations with state and other research agencies.