Gopal Krishan: The Challenge of Massive Urbanization for Sustainable Urban Development
Urbanization today is indeed massive. No less than 54 per cent of the world population was resident of towns and cities in 2017. This amounted to a count of about 4 billion people; three times the total population of India. This equalled the total population of the world just around 4 decades ago in 1975. Today there are no less than 500 ‘million’ cities in the world; among these 20 are mega-cities, each with a population of at least 10 million. India is also going to reach the land mark of half-a-billion urban population at the ensuing 2021 Census of India.
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Manu Raj Sharma, Vihwa B.S. Chandel, Karanjot Kaur Brar: Punjab and Himachal Pradesh: Temperature Variability and Trends Since 1900 AD
Drastic temperature changes have taken place during the last century and are expected to increase critically before the end of 21stcentury. The predicted changes might be more worrisome for certain regions such as north-western India wherein temperatures are projected to escalate at alarming rates. This research paper examines the long-term variability and trends of temperature in Punjab and Himachal Pradesh located in north-western parts of India. The results reveal striking facts about the direction and magnitude of change. The cooling of Punjab Plains during summer, post-monsoon and monsoon season is evident whereas mountainous areas of Himachal Pradesh exhibit warming in almost every season. These warming rates are most conspicuous in the Middle and the Greater Himalayan regions. The warming of winter and post-winter seasons, especially in temperate and cold semi-arid/arid regions of Himachal Pradesh raises serious concerns about impending critical water stress and disruption of hydrological balance upon which rests the economic development of the study area.
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Dinesh Kumar, Omvir Singh: Flood Producing Rainstorms over the Markanda Catchment of North-west India: A Hydrological Study
Flooding in downstream areas of Markanda catchment of north-west India occurs due to heavy rainstorm events in the Siwalik Hills. This study, therefore, aims to analyse the extreme rainstorm events and resulting peak floods during the rainy season (June-September) for the period 1996-2013. The study is based on daily rainfall data of eight rain gauge stations and stream flow measurements collected from various Government departments of Himachal Pradesh and Haryana. The results of the study reveal that rain in the catchment falls at a greater intensity during the month of July, due to onset of south-west monsoon winds, whereas highest contribution of annual rainfall in the catchment was observed during the month of August. The mean annual rainfall of the catchment is 95.7 cm and it varies from about 153 cm at Nahan (rainiest) in upper reaches to about 53 cm (driest) at Gulha in the downstream reaches. However, majority of flood producing rainstorms affecting the Markanda catchment has been of 7-day duration. The study may be useful for policy interventions for mitigation and management of floods in the catchment.
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Preeti, Rajeshwari: Violence against Women in Haryana: Levels and Correlates
Violence against women is a worldwide phenomenon, which exists everywhere in all societies. Women are victims of violence at every stage of their life cycle and it is one of the most pervasive violations of human rights that undermine the health, dignity, security or autonomy of the women victims. In this context, the present paper studies the levels and correlates of violence against women in rural and urban Haryana. The paper is based on primary data, collected from a sample of 501 households spread over four villages and two towns from two districts of the state. The selected districts are representative of least and most reported crime against women. The level of violence and its form is studied vis-à-vis marital status of women in rural as well as in urban areas. In addition to this, violent behaviour is studied in relation to socio-economic characteristics of the respondents. The findings of the study reveal that in the case of ever-married women (ever- married women are those who are not divorced or widowed) there are little rural-urban differential in two different geographical settings. However, a wide gap between the two geographical locations has been observed in case of girls. On the other hand, girl victims of violence are reportedly high in urban sample areas as compared to their rural counterparts. As far as socio-economic characteristics are concerned, violence is prevalent across caste, age and educational qualification in both the geographical settings.
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A K M Anwaruzzaman, Rentu Biswas: Socio-economic Impacts of PMGYS on Murshidabad District (West Bengal), India
Sustained economic development of any region requires an efficient road transport network. It is generally considered a key ingredient for the growth and development. Roads play a significant role in promoting desirable transformation particularly in rural areas. Government of India has initiated Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana (PMGSY) for the development of rural areas. PMGSY is intended to bring social transformation by establishing transportation link to the inhabited but unconnected villages apart from providing employment opportunities to the rural masses. Therefore, prime objective of the present study is to examine the impact of PMGSY scheme on socio-economic transformation of rural areas in Murshidabad district. For this purpose 10 PMGSY road segments connecting 10 villages of Murshidabad district have been selected to collect primary data from 250 respondents. The study reveals that due to improved road connectivity, physical distance has been reduced by 16 per cent and travel time has been reduced to the tune of 40 per cent in Domkal sub-division with implementation of PMGSY. Similarly, the travel cost has reduced by 20 per cent in the district as a whole.
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Gaurav Kalotra, Satish Kumar, Chandni Bhagat: Concentration of Canal Irrigation in Haryana: A Spatial Analysis
Canals are most important source of irrigation in plains where perennial rivers provide water to the canals throughout the year. Haryana is located in northern part of India and it has a semi-arid type of climate. The state has a canal network of 5016 kilometres and about one fourth area of the cultivable land is irrigated by canals. This study, therefore attempts to examine the canal irrigated area under different canal systems and regional variations in the concentration of canal irrigation in Haryana. The study is based on tehsil level data collected from District Statistical Abstracts of Haryana (2010-13). In the triennium of 1966-69, canals were the main source of irrigation in the state and accounted for 76.7 per cent of the net irrigated area but in 2010-13 triennium the area under canal irrigation declined to 41.7 per cent because of the expansion of tube-well irrigation. The tehsil-wise concentration of canal irrigation has been captured by using location quotient index. The study highlights notable regional variations in the concentration of canal irrigation ranging from 0.01 to 2.38 in Gurgaon and Bawani Khera tehsil, respectively during 2010-13.
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Map Series-X: R.C. Chandna: Punjab-Haryana Region: Spatial Dimensions of Scheduled Castes Population, 2011
Even a cursory examination of distributional pattern of scheduled castes population in India brings out vividly that Punjab-Haryana region constitutes one such area in the country where the proportion of scheduled castes population was significantly high-almost two times that of the national average. The comparatively high proportion of scheduled castes population in the study region was associated with (a) comparatively long spell of feudal rule; (b) large landholdings; (c) pioneering status in the country’s green revolution; (d) intensive agriculture; (e) large proportion of agricultural land under labour demanding crops like rice, cotton etc. and (f) their in-migration during last 50 years or so not only from surrounding areas but also from such far off areas as Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh etc. The green revolution brought a revolutionary change in the agricultural scenario here as intensification and commercialization of region’s agriculture not only increased the demand for agricultural labour but also farm wages witnessed an unprecedented increase.
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Doctoral Abstract: Awadh Narayan Choubey: Urban Corridors in India: A Study of the Delhi-Centric Northern Corridor
Urbanization is a process of concentration of population in urban settlements that can be mapped both in space and time. The process occurs as cities grow over time and evolve in their physical limits. It is a movement which initiates from a small town and culminates in a city; in present times they are regarded as mega-city, city-regions or urban corridors. The contemporary process of urbanization has mainly been influenced by the ‘Industrial Revolution’. The new industrial towns were dynamic in nature, remained consistent and continued growing unlike the settlements of the past. Such towns witnessed major changes as a new set of production process started operating at the global and regional levels. These phenomena, together with the development of modern means of transport and communication, gave rise to a new urban system. In this new system, city is everywhere; its footprints are visible even in towns, villages, countryside or its rural hinterland. These are connected by corridors of communication like highways, railway lines, motorways etc. to name a few.
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Doctoral Abstract: Surjit Singh Saini: Risk and Vulnerability Assessment of Floods in Ghaggar River Basin
Floods are the most recurrent natural hazards and leading cause of economic losses worldwide. Presently, about one third of the world’s land area is prone to flooding and 82 per cent population of the world is residing in such flood prone areas. Considering the overall flooding scenario at global scale, the Asian region (particularly south Asia) experiences a very high magnitude of flood events. India is second most flood affected country in the world after Bangladesh and about 12 per cent of India’s geographical area is susceptible to annual flooding. Taking into account the adverse impact of floods on human society and environment, many studies have been conducted to understand the flood occurring phenomena in major perennial rivers of India. Flood hazard is very complex to understand, because it occurs not only due to physical and meteorological causes but anthropogenic factors also play major role in its occurrences. Ghaggar a seasonal river originating in outer Himalayas flowing through Punjab-Haryana plains is subject to severe flooding. Over the past few decades, Ghaggar basin has undergone large scale transformations due to human interventions, affecting natural slope and drainage system very badly throughout the basin. At present larger part of the Ghaggar River is confined to embankments varying between 30 to 300 m in width. Consequently, the Ghaggar River has become more capricious resulting abnormal floods during monsoon season in one or other part of the basin.
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Doctoral Abstract: Seema Choudhary: Quality of Life in Himachal Pradesh: A Case Study of Baijnath Block, Kangra District
Since the very inception of planning in the country, the objectives have been to accelerate economic and social development, alleviate poverty and unemployment, raise the standard of living and quality of life and build a just, equitable and egalitarian society. It is often observed that countries with high per capita Gross National Product (GNP) can have astonishingly low achievements in the quality of life. As such, in the present study development in terms of tangible goods is measured through levels of social and physical infrastructure while the level of satisfaction among the people about their living condition is assessed in terms of quality of life index. Himachal Pradesh being a hilly region has developed very slowly and its overall infrastructure including physical, social and economic was poorly developed in the initial phases of its formation and has led to regional imbalances in the level of infrastructural development in state. In this study, Baijnath Block of Kangra District has been taken as study area as it is least developed in terms of social and physical infrastructure. The study tried to make a deep insight into the socio-economic development of the study area for the two selected decades of 1991 and 2011 in terms of demographic factors such as population growth, density, sex ratio, child sex ratio and literacy. The study also attempted to analyse the socio-physical infrastructural development of the study area for the decades of 1991 and 2011 and in order to get qualitative information about the quality of life, a composite index has been computed on the basis of people’s perception.
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