NUMERICAL AND EXPERIMENTAL INVESTIGATION OF THE PERFORMANCE OF AN EVAPORATIVELY-COOLED CONDENSER

Ph.DDOCTOR OF PHILOSOPH

Conservation Priority Index of species, communities, and habitats for biodiversity conservation and their management planning: A case study in Gulmarg Wildlife Sanctuary, Kashmir Himalaya

The present study is an attempt to evaluate the Conservation Priority Index (CPI) of species, habitats, and communities for their conservation and management planning in the Kashmir Himalayas in India. The present study is an attempt to prioritize 361 plant species, 18 plant communities (10 within the forest zone and 08 within the alpine zone), and 07 habitats for conservation planning. Out of the total plant species recorded, 06 species were categorized as critically endangered, 20 endangered, 28 vulnerable, and 98 species to be near threatened. Amongst the forest and alpine communities, Abies pindrow community and Juniperus squamata-Rhododendron anthopogon mixed community showed the maximum CPI values. Amongst the habitats, dry habitats showed the maximum CPI in the sanctuary. The study found that the threatened species positively correlated with the native and endemic species indicating that these species were rigorously affected due to biotic and abiotic stresses. Based on the results of the present study, we propose a practical method for biodiversity conservation and management of protected areas. The approach employs a variety of qualitative and quantitative features to compute CPI in conjunction with phytosociological data. This kind of study will be immensely helpful to forest officials, policy makers, conservators, and researchers for planning better strategies to conserve and manage particular species, communities, and even habitats in protected areas

The dynamics of language and ethnicity in Mauritius

The link between ethnicity and language has been well established in research but its contextual, perspectual and variable nature demands that this connection be re-examined in each attempt to understand a nation. This paper is about Mauritius, a postcolonial context where French and British colonisation has left salient features which continue to influence the dynamics around language and ethnicity in the country. By describing its demographic characteristics and its linguistic and political situation, I retrieve some of the key facets of this multi-ethnic and multi-lingual nation which evidence resistance by both the state and the populace against the established colonial languages. To compensate for the lack of appropriate theoretical framework in existing research on Mauritius, I use Homi Bhabha’s postcolonial theoretical framework to uncover the realities faced by both the state and the people of this country and the impacts these may have in the workplace

Rethinking non-traditional resistance at work : the case of the Indian Diaspora in Mauritius

Resistance at work can take many forms and this is reflected in the multiple ways it has been theorised in research. In this paper, I use postcolonial theory to analyse employee resistance in Mauritius. To do this, I deploy Homi Bhabha’s concepts of mimicry, ambivalence and hybridity to explore non-traditional forms of resistance among the Indian Diaspora working in the hotel industry. Using ethnographic research, I firstly look at its ‘home’-making practices as it is within the home that visions of community emerge (Bhabha, 1994) which could later influence behaviours at work. I argue that the Diaspora maintains connections with its ancestral roots via routine religious practices and language use while concomitantly resisting assimilation in the local context. The analysis is then extended to their workplace where further forms of non-traditional resistance are found to be enacted which are strongly influenced by the same values emerging at home