Manufacturing Threat: Reality and Rhetoric of Urban Maoism in India

There is an ongoing debate on the issue of Urban Maoism (read Urban Naxal) in India. At a time when the activities of the Maoists (violent or otherwise) have been confined to little pockets of Central and Eastern Indian states, the nature and the intent of the debates around urban Maoism merit scholarly interventions. The debates around the issue of urban Maoism are mainly engaged through two critical positions: one that believes in the existence of the urban Maoists who, according to the votaries of this position, are necessarily working against the Indian state, and the second position that rejects the first one and terms it as a manufactured narrative with a motive to target the dissenters and genuine opposition to the government. Stepping away from these two contrarian and competitive positions, this paper intends to reason with the more significant issues of Maoists’ urban movement and the ongoing urban Maoism debate. In this process, the paper deals with the critical aspects of the Maoist movement in India and attempts to investigate the status of urban Maoism. In the first part, the paper engages with the idea of the urban movement within the larger Maoist revolutionary framework. In doing so, it highlights the process through which there has been a shift favoring the dominance of the urban intellectuals over the Maoist movement. The second part of the paper engages with the status of the urban movement of the Maoists and the threat perception it poses to the state. The last section investigates the intent and the process through which successive governments use the issue of urban Maoism as an instrument of effective rhetoric that helps them further the latter’s interests

Quantifying effects of long-range transport of NO2 over Delhi using back trajectories and satellite data

Exposure to air pollution is a leading public health risk factor in India, especially over densely populated Delhi and the surrounding Indo-Gangetic Plain. During the post-monsoon seasons, the prevailing north-westerly winds are known to influence aerosol pollution events in Delhi by advecting pollutants from agricultural fires as well as from local sources. Here we investigate the year-round impact of meteorology on gaseous nitrogen oxides (). We use bottom-up NOx emission inventories (anthropogenic and fire) and high-resolution satellite measurement based tropospheric column NO2 (TCNO2) data, from S5P aboard TROPOMI, alongside a back-trajectory model (ROTRAJ) to investigate the balance of local and external sources influencing air pollution changes in Delhi, with a focus on different emissions sectors. Our analysis shows that accumulated emissions (i.e. integrated along the trajectory path, allowing for chemical loss) are highest under westerly, north-westerly and northerly flow during pre-monsoon (February–May) and post-monsoon (October–February) seasons. According to this analysis, during the pre-monsoon season, the highest accumulated satellite TCNO2 trajectories come from the east and north-west of Delhi. TCNO2 is elevated within Delhi and the Indo-Gangetic Plain (IGP) to the east of city. The accumulated NOx emission trajectories indicate that the transport and industry sectors together account for more than 80 % of the total accumulated emissions, which are dominated by local sources (>70 %) under easterly winds and north-westerly winds. The high accumulated emissions estimated during the pre-monsoon season under north-westerly wind directions are likely to be driven by high NOx emissions locally and in nearby regions (since NOx lifetime is reduced and the boundary layer is relatively deeper in this season). During the post-monsoon season the highest accumulated satellite TCNO2 trajectories are advected from Punjab and Haryana, where satellite TCNO2 is elevated, indicating the potential for the long-range transport of agricultural burning emissions to Delhi. However, accumulated NOx emissions indicate local (70 %) emissions from the transport sector are the largest contributor to the total accumulated emissions. High local emissions, coupled with a relatively long NOx atmospheric lifetime and shallow boundary layer, aid the build-up of emissions locally and along the trajectory path. This indicates the possibility that fire emissions datasets may not capture emissions from agricultural waste burning in the north-west sufficiently to accurately quantify their influence on Delhi air quality (AQ). Analysis of daily ground-based NO2 observations indicates that high-pollution episodes (>90th percentile) occur predominantly in the post-monsoon season, and more than 75 % of high-pollution events are primarily caused by local sources. But there is also a considerable influence from non-local (30 %) emissions from the transport sector during the post-monsoon season. Overall, we find that in the post-monsoon season, there is substantial accumulation of high local NOx emissions from the transport sector (70 % of total emissions, 70 % local), alongside the import of NOx pollution into Delhi (30 % non-local). This work indicates that both high local NOx emissions from the transport sector and the advection of highly polluted air originating from outside Delhi are of concern for the population. As a result, air quality mitigation strategies need to be adopted not only in Delhi but in the surrounding regions to successfully control this issue. In addition, our analysis suggests that the largest benefits to Delhi NOx air quality would be seen with targeted reductions in emissions from the transport and agricultural waste burning sectors, particularly during the post-monsoon season

Improved realistic stratification model for estimating thermocline thickness in vertical thermal energy storage undergoing simultaneous charging and discharging

Simultaneous charging and discharging operations of thermal energy storages render effective energy-harnessing features. However, it leads to thermocline formation due to the dynamic interplay between energy input, energy extraction, and losses. Reliable retention of good thermodynamic quality of energy is realized by minimizing the energy degradation and thermocline thickness. Near real-time tracking of heat content degradation is a tedious task for real-sized storage systems, which involves accurate quantification of the temporal evolution of thermocline thickness. A few simplified, one-dimensional energy-based models are available for tracking the movement of the thermocline layer inside the thermal energy storage tank. However, these models largely assume the thermocline layer to be a thin horizontal plane within the tank, without quantifying the thermocline thickness. In this study, a reduced-order realistic stratification (RS) model has been developed for the vertical cylindrical tank equipped with an immersed helical discharging coil, working under dual-dynamic mode. For evaluating the thermocline thickness, the prediction equations for the average temperatures in the upper and the lower regions of the tank are formed using a machine-learning-based technique, considering a reasonably wide range of operating and geometrical parameters. The developed model utilizes approximate formulations for the average temperatures of the upper and lower regions of fluid within the storage tank, coil outlet temperature, and the overall average temperature of working fluid. For the larger storage tank (155 L), the thermocline thickness predicted by the new RS model is 738.26 mm at the end of simultaneous charging and discharging operation, whereas that estimated by detailed numerical simulation is 798.12 mm. This improved model reduces the computational time by about 80 % owing to effective approximations and can be used for a reasonably accurate rapid assessment of thermal degradation in the storages deployed for low-temperature solar thermal applications, including domestic hot water systems

From ocean science to sustainable blue economy

Blue economy is defined as the ocean dependent economic development to improve the quality of life of people while ensuring inclusive social development as well as environmental and ecological security. India has committed to advancing the blue economy. The knowledge about fishery resources, sea bed, marine minerals and energy resources and vulnerability to natural hazards is a pre-requisite for the growth and development of the blue economy. The marine fish catch has been a major source of income for one million fishers in India. The technological development for product development to be addressed for commercialization of deep-sea fishery. Geophysical surveys have provided information about coastal placer minerals, gas hydrates on continental shelf and manganese nodules, hydrothermal systems and cobalt crusts in high seas. The investment in developing technologies and human resources for harnessing these resources is being made. The coastal and marine area spatial planning to be employed to understand risks involved and accordingly, developmental activities to be planned. The economic growth prospects beyond 2030 will be limited without large investments in ocean environments. An accounting system to be developed to bring together disparate data sources, both economic and environmental. An institutional framework for implementing activities related to blue economy to be set up. Investments in sustainable development of oceans will pay rich dividends for future generations and benefit humanity

Insurgency versus Democracy: The Violent Clash of Ideas between the Maoists and the Indian State

The end objective of the Maoist insurgency is to overthrow the parliamentary and representative democratic system of the Indian state to herald a ‘new democratic order.’ To the Maoists, Indian democracy is reactionary and oppressive and an instrument of exploitation. A violent movement that the Maoists have been waging against the Indian state can also be seen as a clash of ideas on the forms of democracy that the Indian state and the Maoists believe. Around this clash of ideas on democracy, this chapter investigates how an insurgency with an alternative idea of democracy violently clashes with an established democratic Indian state. In investigating the violent clash of ideas, this paper also addresses the common and divergent issues between the Maoists and the Indian state. The issues of culture of violence, impunity in democracy, and the paradox of counter-violence are discussed in the chapter