Research

Soft Power, according to Jospeh Nye, Jr, who coined the term, is the ability to achieve desired outcomes in international affairs through attraction rather than coercion. Traditionally, cultural and literary exchanges through various festivals, sports – especially like cricket and table-tennis and grants for higher education, have been used as tools of soft power. However, over the past decade, medicine as a tool or currency for diplomacy has become a game-changer in International Relations. USA, China and Cuba have already successfully implemented healthcare or medical diplomacy as an integral part of their foreign policy. UK is also looking at using their well-established NHS as the way forward. However, as far as India is concerned, while health/medical tourism is a watchword for India, and India has sent medical support as part of humanitarian aid to different parts of the world, in response to various natural calamities and other situations, including engaging in vaccine diplomacy during the pandemic, we are yet to formalize a strategy or policy on healthcare diplomacy. Given the absence of any formalised policy for medical or healthcare diplomacy in India, the purpose of this paper is to explore whether India can use medicine/healthcare as a currency to advance its interests in the present international order; and whether healthcare diplomacy can be incorporated as a strategy and an instrument of soft power in India’s foreign policy concerns.

Philosophers through the ages have attempted to probe beyond the appearance of things into the nature of reality, seeking ultimate truth. In investigating the labyrinths of one’s mind, as one watches the play of the senses and its restless tricks and our seemingly solid ground perpetually shifts moment to moment in its own impermanence. This investigation into the nature and experience of ultimate reality will point to the construction and dismantling of the deep delusions in the way the mind sees, makes meaning and engages with the ‘self’ and ‘other’. Our perception of our reality, although a fabrication of thought-abstractions and mental projections, has ethical implications, and influences how we relate to one another and our world. In the midst of a pandemic, a study of the mind and nature of reality, has immediate implications for the world that we share with other people and plays a role in how we construct our collective future. This study will present the intricate mind-sprung constructedness of the veil that obscures our seeing of reality. It will investigate the nature of reality as emptiness, guided by Buddhism and insights found in the poetry of Lal Ded and Kabir. It will go on to outline tools offered by Buddhism, Lal Ded and Kabir to rend this veil, leading to the realisation of emptiness.

A nation’s security policy is essentially aimed at creating and sustaining the space - regionally and globally - which enables it to pursue its national interests. Devising such a policy requires an assessment of external environment, the nature and intensity of the threat as well as the means, both internal and external, to mitigate such a threat. It is therefore a critical instrument to understand the nature of threats and the avenues and approaches applied by the State to deal with it. India is a diverse democracy with multiplicity of political actors at play. The most visible of those are the political parties, both regional and national, who are prime drivers of the public discourse and also of the public policy. In the initial years after the independence, this diversity was relatively less pronounced at the policy level given the prominence of the Congress party which ruled at the centre as well as in the majority of the states. The single-party dominance implied a relatively one-dimensional approach to policy making. This was true also in case of making of security policy. The one party-dominance started fading in the mid-seventies, essentially after the emergency, and the phenomenon of coalition of political parties to form government started gaining currency. The coalition inevitably meant a multi-dimensional approach to policy to satisfy the multiple and at time conflicting interests of the coalition partners. The diversity thus started getting pronounced at the policy level as well. This diversity of political opinions and resulting lack of consensus is reflected also in the making of security policy. There is no unanimity in the political class, for instance, in the approach to deal with the Pakistan or China, arguably the two most significant strategic challenges facing India. Similarly, there are differing approach to deal with terrorism and the insurgencies as well. The advent of coalition governments compounded this effect of the differing opinions. The proposed study intends to study comprehensively the dynamics of Coalition Governments and its impact on the making of Security Policy in India. It bases on the primary assumption that a nuanced study, which incorporates the variables such as ideological inclinations of the coalition partners, political capital, the nature of the leadership along with the contemporary structural environment, is imperative to have a comprehensive study of Security Policy Making in India.

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Dissent is an integral part of political life. Liberal democracies protect the right to dissent by enshrining the freedom of speech and expression in their constitutions, and the judiciary is tasked with the responsibility of protecting such political rights. In practice though, the protection of these rights is substantially conditioned by the existing political discourse, and what judges think of the individuals seeking legal recourse to protect their rights. In contemporary India, similar agitations have been dealt with differently by courts. This seems affected by not merely the constitutional or legal questions involved in the case, but also by what the judges think of the ‘protester.’ This paper enquires into the image of the ‘good protester’ – someone who’s right to dissent needs to be protected and their grievances attended to – as seen in the judgments relating to anti-CAA (Citizenship Amendment Act) agitations and farmers’ protests. Even when the Government of India was explicitly opposed to both expressions of dissent, the Supreme Court’s handling of cases relating to the two agitations was substantially different. On the one hand, the Supreme Court refused to stay the CAA and has not even begun hearings on the pending case relating to the constitutional validity of the act. On the other, the court “stayed the implementation” of the three laws farmers were opposed to on grounds that have been questioned by legal experts. What is also noteworthy is the image of the ‘protester’ in these judgments. In the Shaheen Bagh case, possibly the most well-known of the anti-CAA agitations, the Supreme Court held that women protesters “appeared to no longer have the ability to call off the protest themselves” and “a huge periphery comprising male protestors, volunteers and bystanders... seemed to have a stake in the continuance of the blockade of the road” thus professionalising the protester and disassociating them from the cause (Amit Sahni v. Commissioner of Police & Others, 2020, para 10). On the other hand, in the judgment on the farmers’ protests, the Supreme Court of explicitly stated the following: “Laudably, the farmers have so far carried on the agitation peacefully and without any untoward incident (Rakesh Vaishnav & Others v. Union of India & Others, 2021, para 6 [emphasis added]). Thus, the image of the protester is notably different in these judgments. This paper undertakes a textual analysis of the judgments relating to the two agitations to comprehend the image of the protester underlying this jurisprudence. A study of this image of the protester is important because it has significant impact on the broader public debate, and also influences lower courts’ approach to similar cases.

References
Amit Sahni v. Commissioner of Police & Others, 2020. Supreme Court of India.
Rakesh Vaishnav & Others v. Union of India & Others, 2021. Supreme Court of India.

My graduate research was to assemble a history of the eastern borderlands of the United States and Canada by using a route system as the central artefact. The ‘Canada Road’ was a network in the northern Appalachian Mountains that linked the Arctic, Atlantic and Mississippi worlds. The project took ten years of archeological and geographic fieldwork, coupled with detailed oral history and archival research in North America and Europe. It revealed a history that had been all but forgotten. My American advisors told me it was an ‘impossible’ topic and suggested I change it, but my French advisors told me to proceed, since it was an excellent example of histoire totale, an interdisciplinary study. The project therefore had significance in its methodology and its theoretical approaches, as much as in its topic. We established a research collection of informants materials and primary documents at the University of Maine, while the work also led to the commemoration of the route by the United States and Canadian governments. I am in the final stages of a book on this work – Backwoods Globalization: The Canada Road System of North America, from Pangea to the Present.

"This project aims to document the lyrical expressions of the migrants from Uttar Pradesh and Bihar nested in Kolkata. The soundscape of Kolkata contains a so called deshwali dhun – unfortunately can’t be translated to country music, which is always there, and remains unnoticed. The migrant labourers from the upland practice their music(s) on the pavements, in roadside temples, in dingy blind lanes, almost in every possible place throughout the year. The form of lyric that concern this project is kajri,the most popular form of poetry that can encountered on the streets of Kolkata. This research aims to analyze kajris that one hears on the footpaths of Kolkata by the deshwalis who try to forge a link with their ‘desh’ through these songs. An expression that takes them back home, lightens them from the burdens of migration when they establish a home in bidesh through a community of verses, songs and performances. Kajri is important to document because it can be read as an eminent example of secular poetry rooted in history, culture, region, spirituality and an emotional representation of village life. The outcome of this project will lead to a set of archival quality audio/video recordings that can provide material for a documentary and a monograph which might serve as an authentic source for future research in cultural studies, literary studies and migration studies."

Skin pigmentation due to its conspicuous nature has been the focus of numerous anthropological investigations both historically and in current times. With the availability of empirical measuring devices that are based on reflectance of incident light, it is now possible to record quantitative measure of melanin levels in populations, revealing a true picture of nature of pigmentation diversity that exists between populations. Likewise, characterisation of genetic variants influencing skin pigmentation diversity in populations is revealing the complex nature of this phenotype. This presentation will contextualise the need for need for skin pigmentation studies focusing on pigmentation diversity in South Asian populations and highlight some of the results and their implications that have emerged over the 3 projects undertaken by me.
I. Skin Pigmentation diversity in West Maharashtra (Completed): this project investigated the skin pigmentation diversity in among 6 populations of west Maharashtra. The objective was to assess if populations occupying a small geographical zone exhibit uniform pigmentation profiles as they are all exposed to uniform environmental conditions. Results reveal that pigmentation varies in populations from varied social groups. Caste populations show lower melanin levels as compared to tribal populations. 3 (SLC24A5, SLC45A2 and TYR) genes were identified to be associated with melanin levels, of which 1 SLC24A5 was significant after controlling for population and social group as covariates.
II. Identify signatures of positive selection in pigmentation genes among South Asian populations (completed) – whole genome scan to identify pigmentation genes that show positive selection. Results highlight 3 previously un-associated genes to show significant association in South Asian populations. These genes are involved in melanosome transport and could be possible candidate genes.
III. MC1R diversity in West Maharashtra (Ongoing) – This project looks at examining sequence diversity at MC1R to assess if this gene plays an important role in determining the pigmentation of an individual in West Maharashtra populations. Mutations in MC1R are associated with a decrease in skin pigmentation, melanoma, freckling, and red/blond hair. It is seen that variation at MC1R has been constrained in high UVR populations due to purifying selection, however, Recent studies in Africans by (Crawford et al. 2017; Martin et al. 2017) have shown high frequency of alleles contributing to light skin, warranting the need for a closer examination of genes controlling skin color diversity in dark skinned populations such as South Asians.

Scholarship on gender and science in India largely does not emphasize distinctions between the various subfields of the natural sciences and mathematics. However, there are crucial distinctions between disciplines such as biology, geology, physics, chemistry, etc. both from an epistemological standpoint, as well as from the standpoint of the particular set of social, cultural, political considerations guiding the growth of a discipline. The gender disparity in the field of physics research is stark in India. According to a recent report (Resmi et al, 2019), on average, about 19% of tenured physics faculty in universities in India are women, while in research institutions the corresponding percentage is only 11%. Studies (Barinaga, 1994; Hasse, 2009) indicate that there is a need to understand such gaps in representation in the sciences in the context of specific cultures, since there are country-specific deviations in patterns of representation. Götschel (2011) suggests three dimensions along which questions of gender and physics can be discussed, namely those of human actors, workplace cultures, and knowledge production. In India, several organized bodies have been constituted to deliberate on the status of women in physics (or the sciences more broadly), and it is worthwhile to examine their cognizance of the three dimensions and the weightage they allocate to each in their vision of a more inclusive future for the practice of physics in India. Through semi-structured interviews with members of some of these organized bodies, we
propose to report the orientations and priorities of those leading such endeavours.

References
Barinaga, M. (1994). Surprises across the cultural divide. Science, 263(5152), 1468-1470.
https://doi.org/10.1126/science.263.5152.1468
Götschel, H. (2011). The entanglement of gender and physics: Human actors, workplace
cultures, and knowledge production. Science & Technology Studies.
https://sciencetechnologystudies.journal.fi/article/view/55270
Hasse, C. in Chapter 5 In O. Skovsmose, P. Valero, & O. R. Christensen (Eds.), University
Science and Mathematics Education in Transition. Springer US.
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-0-387-09829-6
Resmi, L., Shastri, P., Goswami, S., Pandey, P., Nanal, V., Kharb, P., ... & Chatterjee, S. (2019,
June). Gender status in the Indian physics profession and the way forward. In AIP
Conference Proceedings (Vol. 2109, No. 1, p. 050019). AIP Publishing LLC.
https://doi.org/10.1063/1.5110093

"The study based in Simla district in India, discusses how cultural systems permeate every dimension of rural life in villages in the state of Himachal Pradesh in the country. The deity cult gives meaning and purpose to people's lives and has significance in community bonding. It is also important for co-operation and ecological conservation. The study goes on to discuss how women in the selected villages relate to Sita, a female Goddess who is venerated in different parts of India, with different meanings attached to her. In many of the surveyed villages, she is worshipped as the goddess who protects water sources, and is a custodian of women's indigenous knowledge around water and soil conservation, and of women's significance to agriculture and agricultural based livelihoods. In other surveyed villages, agriculture's decline, has led to a decline in the significance of women as contributors to the households' resources, as also to a change in the meaning attached to Sita. Social issues (along with gendered contexts) define the relationship with each other, with ecology and with gods and goddesses. "

Migration does not take place in a social, cultural, political and institutional void (de Haas 2008). It is socially embedded and culturally informed within the transnational social field of the sending and receiving communities creating a ‘culture of migration’ embedding economic and cultural values to the aspiration and inclination of mobility (Glick-Schiller, Basch and Blanc, 1992; Levitt, 2001; Kandel and Massey, 2002; Jónsson, 2008). Transnational networks influence not just the life of immigrants but also the communities and countries of origin in all socio-cultural aspects including religion. It builds social fields in the form of social remittance that are transformed to social capital which is aspired by the non-migrant. The transnational experience of the non-migrant leads to new aspirations among individuals and families strengthening old traditions of migration, while also reinforcing new paths and destinations. This need to immerse and embrace the global cultural economy has resulted in the ‘culture of migration’ in the Doab region of Punjab over the last century. While there is an increase in the non-Jat, migrations out of Punjab, the opportunities are restricted for the unskilled to low paid and temporary jobs which are insecure and individualised. The unskilled aspirant with low social and financial capital takes the burden of limiting possibilities of mobility leading to a state of ‘involuntary immobility’ (Carling, 2002) within a culture of migration. The non-migrant while not moving spaces through physical mobility, is nevertheless engaged with changed contexts of living experiences and expectations. Migration literature however, does not account for the experiences of the non-migrant and the social fields that they engage with. For a complete understanding of the migration network, the paper presents an ethnographic account of the economic, social and psychological dimensions of the aspirant’s departure context outlining the negotiations and renegotiations with human and beyond human mechanisms further promoting a culture of mobility among populations. The current research adds to the Indian experience of transnationalism and the culture of migration in the region of Punjab by exploring the socio-economic and religious intersections of a population with a long tradition and history of migration. The work outlines a certain degree of emotional and psychological gravity that permeates the cultural and social space of the region through accounts of people’s aspirations, in context of the multi-million-dollar migration industry and the influence it has on the narratives established with media, employment and educational opportunities and everyday lived experiences including religion as a coping mechanism in dealing with the problems and hurdles of migration reiterating the global realities within localised fields.

References
Carling, J. 2002. “Migration in the age of involuntary immobility”. Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, 28(1): pp.5-42.
de Haas, Hein. 2010. “Migration and development. A theoretical perspective”. International Migration Review, 44(1): pp227-264
Glick-Schiller. Nina, Linda Basch and Cristina Szanton Blanc. 1992. “Towards a transnational perspective on migration: race, class, ethnicity, and nationalism reconsidered”. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences Volume 645, New York Academy of Sciences.
Jonsson, G. 2008. Migration Aspirations and Immobility in a Malian Soninke Village, Working Paper 10. International Migration Institute James Martin 21st century School University of Oxford
Kandel, W. and Massey, D.S. 2002. “The Culture of Mexican Migration: A Theoretical and Empirical Analysis”. Social Forces, March, 80(3): pp. 981-1004.
Levitt, Peggy 2001 Transnational Migration: Comparative Perspectives, Paper presented at Workshop Wellesley College and Harvard, University on June 30- July 1, 2001. Princeton University