From jeebesh at sarai.net Wed Aug 1 08:54:12 2007 From: jeebesh at sarai.net (Jeebesh Bagchi) Date: Wed, 1 Aug 2007 22:24:12 +0530 Subject: [Urbanstudy] Fwd: Invitation for Press Conference on August 3, 2007, 4 PM, Press Club References: <34de8130708010947u5b74850ck4e946a690bcad3ea@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: Someone check this out!! Begin forwarded message: > From: "pnn hindi" > Date: 1 August 2007 10:17:57 PM GMT+05:30 > Subject: Invitation for Press Conference on August 3, 2007, 4 PM, > Press Club > > Dear , > > The Campaign for Judicial Accountability and Reforms is holding a > Press Conference on August 3, 2007 at the Press Club of India, > Raisina Road, New Delhi at 4 PM to highlight a grave case of > Judicial Misconduct at the Apex of the Indian Judiciary. At the > press conference we will disclose how the then Chief Justice of > India who had spearheaded the sealing drive was mired in serious > conflict of interest in as much as his sons were deeply involved in > the business of shopping malls and commercial complexes who stood > to benefit from this sealing drive. Very important revelations will > be made and documents released about this case. Where The Press > Conference will be addressed by Shri Shanti Bhushan, former Union > Law Minister, Mr. Bhaskar Rao, Chairman, Centre for Media Studies, > Ms. Kamini Jaiswal, advocate, Supreme Court and Mr. Prashant > Bhushan among others. Kindly send a reporter to cover the Press > Conference. > > > > Thanking you, > > (PRASHANT BHUSHAN) > > > > PS: incase you are unable to attend please send a colleague to > cover the conference > > > > Please feel free to call: Devvrat (981181730) or Leena (9811137421) > > > -- > Campaign for Judicial Accountability and Judicial Reforms > 14, Tower 2, Supreme Enclave, Mayur Vihar Phase- INew Delhi- 110 091 > Tel: 9811137421, 9811818730; > E-mail:judicialreforms at gmail.com -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: Hindi Invitation.pdf Type: application/pdf Size: 11576 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/urbanstudygroup/attachments/20070801/4874abb2/attachment.pdf -------------- next part -------------- From sanjeev.rgtu at gmail.com Thu Aug 2 11:30:10 2007 From: sanjeev.rgtu at gmail.com (Sanjeev Sharma) Date: Fri, 3 Aug 2007 01:00:10 +0530 Subject: [Urbanstudy] Second Call for Paper - Bharatiya Vigyan Sammelan, BVS 2007, Bhopal MP Message-ID: <311151090708021230l71d71f2fw6ead24fda048c70a@mail.gmail.com> Bharatiya Vigyan Sammelan, 23-25 November, 2007 http://www.bvsindia.org The focal theme of the conference is - *Integral Scientific Management of Natural Resources For Sustainable Development with special focus on Best Traditional and Current Practices in Agri-Forestry and Rural Technology in India and Abroad. * In addition to individual delegates and representatives from institutions, the conference will also have associate delegates comprising of Post-graduates and Research Scholars as observers, selected from R&D institutions, Colleges and Universities. We invite all Scientists, Technocrats, Academicians, Policy Makers, Research Scholars, Students and common people who have an affinity towards Science and Technology to participate and contribute to this conference. Science and Technology, forms the thrust engine of development for any society. An overwhelmingly large number of over 6 lac villages still await infrastructure facilities and basic amenities. There is a growing disparity between the haves and the have-nots. It is becoming increasingly imperative that inclusive growth becomes a reality and not just a slogan. We have a gigantic task at hand. Effective intervention through appropriate technologies can play an important role in providing urban amenities in rural areas. These interventions will be able to control the ever-growing problems of urbanization, rural poverty, environmental degradation and unequal growth. Language plays a very significant role in the 'lab to land' concept. In our country, with 23 recognized official national languages including Hindi and English, language plays a key role in science and technology dissemination among the masses.India, a nation of a billion people, cradle of the oldest civilization of mankind, is marching ahead with indomitable power and incorrigible confidence. Home to the 2nd largest population of the world, we have to fulfill a billion dreams as well as our global responsibilities The conference shall comprise of invited talks from eminent personalities in the area of interest and contributed papers for oral/poster presentations. Scientists, Technologists, Research Scholars, Policy makers and Stake Holders in S & T are invited to send two page Extended Abstracts (in Hindi or English or both) of their papers before 15th August, 2007. The Abstracts should be accompanied with Registration form for attending the conference. The Abstracts and full paper may be sent as MS-Word files to :\ bvs at rgtu.net The Abstracts can also be sent as hard copies to * Executive Chairman, Bhartiya Vigyan Sammelan, Samanvay Karyalaya, B-44, 45 Banglow, Professors Colony, Opp Mulla Ramuzi Bhawan, Bhopal, MP* * Conference Theme:* 1. Agriculture, Horticulture, Animal Husbandry and Veterinary Sciences 2. Forestry and Environmental Sciences 3. Water Management 4. Energy Management 5. Mineral Resources and Materials Science/Technology 6. Meteorology and Climate 7. Health and Medical Sciences including AYUSH and Nutraceuticals 8. Housing, Habitat and Architecture 9. Basic Sciences : Mathematics, Physics, Chemistry, Geology, Astronomy, Life Sciences. 10. Cutting Edge Technologies (BIO, IT, NANO - Status and Possibilities) 11. Science Communication through Regional Languages 12. Engineering and Technological Sciences 13 Marine and Aquaculture Sciences Last date for : Abstract Submission :30th August, 2007 Notification for Acceptance : 30th September, 2007 Submission of Full Text of paper :15th October, 2007 Registration:15th October, 2007 *The Registration fee,* for the conference, which shall include the conference material and working lunch during the conference period, is as follows : Institutional Delegates : Rs. 5,000/- (upto 3 delegates) Individual Delegates : Rs. 1,000/- Research Scholars and Members of Organizing Institutions: Rs. 500/- Student Observers and Persons accompanying delegates : Rs. 500/- email : bvs at rgtu.net url: http://www.bvsindia.org Conference Dates : November 23-25, 2007 Venue: Ravindra Bhawan, Bhopal Our mailing address is: Samanvay Karyalaya, B-44, 45 Banglow Opposite Mulla Ramuzi Bhawan, Professors Colony, Bhopal, MP Our Contect: bvs at rgtu.net -- Sanjeev Sharma Faculty. School of Information Technology Rajiv Gandhi Technological University, Air Port By Pass Road, Bhopal (M.P.) India 462 036 PH: +917552678825 Fax : +917552678834 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/urbanstudygroup/attachments/20070803/0c7cd453/attachment-0001.html From renu_d at berkeley.edu Fri Aug 3 10:05:41 2007 From: renu_d at berkeley.edu (renu_d at berkeley.edu) Date: Fri, 3 Aug 2007 11:05:41 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Urbanstudy] Call for Papers: Interrogating Urbanism in Contemporary South Asia Message-ID: <1770.75.20.207.220.1186164341.squirrel@calmail.berkeley.edu> Hi everyone, I am a PhD candidate at the Dept of Architecture at the University of California, Berkeley. Along with another colleague I am organizing a one-day symposium titled "Cities and Citizenship: Interrogating Urbanism in Contemporary South Asia" in February 2008. Attached below is the Call for Papers. My own research is on the politics of urban redevelopment in Ahmedabad and although I haven't made any postings here before, for more than a year now I have been tuned into some of the discussions on this group. So I hope that we will receive some paper abstracts from some of the folks whose postings I've read. Although unfortunately we don't have a large budget and will not be able to offer any travel assistance. Regards, Renu ----------------------- Symposium on CITIES AND CITIZENSHIP: INTERROGATING URBANISM IN CONTEMPORARY SOUTH ASIA February 14, 2008 University of California, Berkeley (exact location to be announced) Sponsored by the Center for South Asia Studies, University of California, Berkeley CALL FOR PAPERS The history of cities has long favored the West as the center of urbanization, thus casting the cities of the Global South in the rhetoric of delayed development and borrowed modernities. Indeed, the postcolonial condition of South Asian cities has been continually rendered as the shadow of former colonial cities struggling to cope with inefficiencies of the postcolonial state in managing urbanization and more recently with pressures of globalization and transnational forces. In order to move beyond a dialogue which frames the cities of the developing world as derivative of a Euro-Ameri-centric core we propose an interrogation of South Asian cities through the theoretical lens of citizenship. The evolving definition of citizenship—originally a product of the urban enclave (as in the medieval bastide or the polis) to a right defined by a larger national political community—is being recalibrated once again as cities around the world become the salient units of economic and political change. The notion of republican citizenship, as premised on an idea of universal liberalism, has most strenuously been challenged in the urban sphere, be it through the ghettoization of minorities or the growing enclaves of the wealthy. At the same time, diverse initiatives and grassroots mobilizations have emerged to counter old and new urban inequalities and spatial exclusions. Although the re-scripting of urban space in cities across the world is thus producing new notions of citizenship, both restrictive and expansive, the modalities through which these are produced remain contingent upon historical and geographical specificities. South Asian cities have recently come center-stage through innovative explorations in fiction, photography, and documentary film. This one-day symposium will provide a forum for cross-disciplinary dialogue which brings these perspectives from the humanities in conversation with those in the social sciences in order to investigate the urban realm. We encourage submissions that deal with cities in Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, and Sri Lanka as a means to expand the discussion of South Asian urbanism beyond the case-study of India. We invite papers that speak to the issues outlined in the following three themes: I. Propertied Citizenship and Landscapes of Consumption Following market liberalization, South Asian cities have witnessed a rapid integration into global consumer markets and commodity networks, fostering new and more aggressive consumption practices. With the re-ordering of urban space in a global economic context in which cities compete for capital, jobs, and tourists, property has also become an increasingly significant register through which elite groups pressure the state to “clean up” cities in order to privilege their own needs and sensibilities. These shifts are reflected in new urban phenomena such as the mushrooming of shopping malls and gated communities and the proliferation of technology parks. We invite papers which focus on the city as a nexus of global networks, local vectors of management and reform, and consumption practices. II. Recalibrating Urban Governmentality Following neo-liberal reforms in recent decades, South Asian cities have played a crucial role in the rescaling of the state and the decentralization of government apparatuses. For example, the pressures of globalization on labor coupled with efforts to ensure a city’s position in the new global economy has led to the creation of extra-governmental spaces of production, such as Special Economic Zones. The rise of civil-society movements and non-governmental organizations has also led to a significant recalibration of urban governmentality. Notwithstanding these new modalities of governmentality which involve a constellation of non-state actors, the right to land and resources made by an individual or community continues to engage the state and political actors at various scales, often mobilizing informal practices such as squatting and land-grabbing which involve highly politicized negotiations. We invite papers that examine the role of the state in the contemporary urban realm and that speak to various agents and processes that challenge the managerial sovereignty of the state therein. III. Re-scripting Identity through Urban Space The diversity within South Asian societies, the historical legacies of colonialism, and most recently the processes of globalization have continually brought forth challenges to the modern nation-state and democracy in the region. Many of these challenges are articulated and played out in the urban arena, through an assemblage of spatial practices. For example, the occupation of the city through religious processions, the construction of violent spatial imaginaries that pit religious groups against each other, and the redefinition of the urban subject through hegemonic constructions of masculinity or femininity, appropriate the city as a site of contestation over the nation and the state. We invite papers that focus on the re-scripting of ethnic, racial, class, and gendered identities in/through urban space and which explore this through different media such as art, film, literature, performance and so forth. Paper abstracts will be accepted by e-mail at southasiancities at gmail.com through September 15, 2007. Abstracts should be 400-500 words in length and authors should attach the abstract as a Word document as well as include the text of the abstract in the body of the message. Please be sure to include the following information in the e-mail as well: Full name, departmental affiliation, degree program, and the title of your abstract. Accepted authors will receive e-mail notification no later than October 15, 2007. Accepted authors will be expected to submit a draft working paper by January 10, 2008. For additional information, please contact the symposium coordinators: Romola Sanyal (romi_s at berkeley.edu) or Renu Desai (renu_d at berkeley.edu). From pnnhindi at gmail.com Sat Aug 4 07:34:09 2007 From: pnnhindi at gmail.com (pnn hindi) Date: Sat, 4 Aug 2007 21:04:09 +0530 Subject: [Urbanstudy] NEWS- WITHER JUDICIAL ACCOUNTABILITY? THE CASE OF JUSTICE SABHARWAL Message-ID: Click Here To See The Documents, Concerning The Facts WITHER JUDICIAL ACCOUNTABILITY? THE CASE OF JUSTICE SABHARWAL: DISQUIETING FACTS, DISTURBING IMPLICATIONS Minakshi PNN: 3, Aug. The issue of accountability of the higher judiciary has long been troubling all sections of society so at a press conference held in Press Club of India the former Law minister Shanti Bhushan and sr. advocate Supreme court Prashant Bhushan among others highlighted a grave case of judicial misconduct at the Apex of Indian Judiciary on behalf of campaign for Judicial Accountability and Reforms. Prashant Bhushan exposed that on 16'" February 2006, the then Chief Justice of India, Y.K. Sabharwal passed a detailed order setting into motion the process of sealing of properties in designated residential areas of Delhi, being used for commercial purposes, forcing to buy or rent premises in shopping malls and commercial complexes.. The Court's orders were ostensibly made to implement the rule of law as embodied by the Delhi Master Plan 2001, which had designated the land use of those areas as residential. Despite the new master 2021 the court ordered the sealing to continue, despite the fact that the new master plan permitted the owners to use their premises for commercial purposes. He further added the prices of shops and offices in the shopping malls and commercial complexes doubled and tripled almost overnight making many people question whether the sealing drive was being undertaken for the benefit of the Mall and Commercial complex developers. De facto these orders were being made by Justice Sabharwal, his two sons, Chetan and Nitin who until then had small export import businesses, had entered into partnerships with big Mall and Commercial complex developers Kabul Chawla of the BPTP group and , Purshottam Bagheria and had become big Commercial complex developers themselves. Till 2004, the Sabharwals owned 3 companies ostensibly doing small time export import business, Pawan Impex, Sabs exports and Sug exports. their officially settled at the Sabharwals' family home at 3/81 Punjabi Bagh. In January 2004 they were shifted to Justice Sabharwal's official residence at 6 Moti Lal Nehru Marg and on 7 May 2004, Justice Sabharwal had ordered the sealing of properties where industries had been running in residential areas? but his official residence could hardly be sealed. Just after the order of sealing his sons were well on their way to entering the business of Malls and commercial complexes in a big way, having sewn up partnerships with two of the biggest Commercial estate developers in Delhi business of the Sabharwals really took off thereafter. On 22/8/06, Pawan Impex was given a loan of 28 Crores by the Union Bank of lndia, Connaught Place on the security of imaginary plant, machinery and other assets" lying at plot Nos A 3, 4, &, 5 in Sector 125, Noida, nothing in actual, only a huge 1.T. park (5 lac Sq Ft, worth hundreds of crores. Interestingly, these 3 huge plots of 12,000 Sq. Metres in a prime sector of Noida were allotted to Pawan Impex on 29 Dec 2004 by the Mulayam Singh/Amar Singh government of U.P. at a rate of only Rs. 3,700/sq Metre, another huge commercial plot of 12,000 sq metres (plot 12A, in Sector 68, which appears to have been carved out later as an afterthought) on 10 November 2006, at a price of 4000 Rs/sq metre, 3 plots (C1033, lO4 and 105) of 800 Sq M each in Sector 63 at a rate of Rs. 2, I 00 each, other in Sector 8 Noida, the CBI investigation into the allotments ordered by the Allahabad High Court was immediately stayed by Justice B.P. Singh of the Supreme Court moreover the publication of the infamous Amar Singh tapes, was stayed by Justice Sabharwal himself on the matter being merely mentioned before him. Thus, the Sabharwals in just two years time, got into the business of developing Commercial complexes and appear to be rolling in money during the time when Justice Sabharwal was a senior judge and then Chief Justice, dealing with the sealing cases and passing orders. Former law minister Shanti Bhushan also said that the conduct of Justice Sabharwal and his sons appear to involve offences and misdemeanors beyond the Income Tax Act. His orders are against the principles of natural justice, which say that no judge can hear a case in which he is personally interested. It is in fact arguable that his dealing with this case in such circumstances involves an offence under the Prevention of Corruption Act. He and other senior Judges and advocates demanded the need to be thoroughly probed, particularly to see how and to what extent they funded the activities and acquistion of assets of the Sabharwals. whether their acquisition can be legitimately explained. A call was made to the society to pressurize the Parliament and the government to bring a suitable Constitutional Amendment Bill for this purpose. 011 22756796, 9211530510 PNN , Delhi-91 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/urbanstudygroup/attachments/20070804/bda98e33/attachment.html From esg at bgl.vsnl.net.in Mon Aug 6 01:03:51 2007 From: esg at bgl.vsnl.net.in (ESG VSNL) Date: Mon, 06 Aug 2007 14:33:51 +0530 Subject: [Urbanstudy] [Fwd: [pnnhindi] News on WITHER JUDICIAL ACCOUNTABILITY? THE CASE OF JUSTICESABHARWAL] Message-ID: <46B6E3F7.5000006@bgl.vsnl.net.in> http://judicialaccontbility.blogspot.com/ WITHER JUDICIAL ACCOUNTABILITY? THE CASE OF JUSTICE SABHARWAL: DISQUIETING FACTS, DISTURBING IMPLICATIONS Minakshi PNN: 3, Aug. The issue of accountability of the higher judiciary has long been troubling all sections of society so at a press conference held in Press Club of India the former Law minister Shanti Bhushan and sr. advocate Supreme court Prashant Bhushan among others highlighted a grave case of judicial misconduct at the Apex of Indian Judiciary on behalf of campaign for Judicial Accountability and Reforms. Prashant Bhushan exposed that on 16'" February 2006, the then Chief Justice of India, Y.K. Sabharwal passed a detailed order setting into motion the process of sealing of properties in designated residential areas of Delhi, being used for commercial purposes, forcing to buy or rent premises in shopping malls and commercial complexes.. The Court's orders were ostensibly made to implement the rule of law as embodied by the Delhi Master Plan 2001, which had designated the land use of those areas as residential. Despite the new master 2021 the court ordered the sealing to continue, despite the fact that the new master plan permitted the owners to use their premises for commercial purposes. He further added the prices of shops and offices in the shopping malls and commercial complexes doubled and tripled almost overnight making many people question whether the sealing drive was being undertaken for the benefit of the Mall and Commercial complex developers. De facto these orders were being made by Justice Sabharwal, his two sons, Chetan and Nitin who until then had small export import businesses, had entered into partnerships with big Mall and Commercial complex developers Kabul Chawla of the BPTP group and , Purshottam Bagheria and had become big Commercial complex developers themselves. Till 2004, the Sabharwals owned 3 companies ostensibly doing small time export import business, Pawan Impex, Sabs exports and Sug exports. their officially settled at the Sabharwals' family home at 3/81 Punjabi Bagh. In January 2004 they were shifted to Justice Sabharwal's official residence at 6 Moti Lal Nehru Marg and on 7 May 2004, Justice Sabharwal had ordered the sealing of properties where industries had been running in residential areas? but his official residence could hardly be sealed. Just after the order of sealing his sons were well on their way to entering the business of Malls and commercial complexes in a big way, having sewn up partnerships with two of the biggest Commercial estate developers in Delhi business of the Sabharwals really took off thereafter. On 22/8/06, Pawan Impex was given a loan of 28 Crores by the Union Bank of lndia, Connaught Place on the security of imaginary plant, machinery and other assets" lying at plot Nos A 3, 4, &, 5 in Sector 125, Noida, nothing in actual, only a huge 1.T. park (5 lac Sq Ft, worth hundreds of crores. Interestingly, these 3 huge plots of 12,000 Sq. Metres in a prime sector of Noida were allotted to Pawan Impex on 29 Dec 2004 by the Mulayam Singh/Amar Singh government of U.P. at a rate of only Rs. 3,700/sq Metre, another huge commercial plot of 12,000 sq metres (plot 12A, in Sector 68, which appears to have been carved out later as an afterthought) on 10 November 2006, at a price of 4000 Rs/sq metre, 3 plots (C1033, lO4 and 105) of 800 Sq M each in Sector 63 at a rate of Rs. 2, I 00 each, other in Sector 8 Noida, the CBI investigation into the allotments ordered by the Allahabad High Court was immediately stayed by Justice B.P. Singh of the Supreme Court moreover the publication of the infamous Amar Singh tapes, was stayed by Justice Sabharwal himself on the matter being merely mentioned before him. Thus, the Sabharwals in just two years time, got into the business of developing Commercial complexes and appear to be rolling in money during the time when Justice Sabharwal was a senior judge and then Chief Justice, dealing with the sealing cases and passing orders. Former law minister Shanti Bhushan also said that the conduct of Justice Sabharwal and his sons appear to involve offences and misdemeanors beyond the Income Tax Act. His orders are against the principles of natural justice, which say that no judge can hear a case in which he is personally interested. It is in fact arguable that his dealing with this case in such circumstances involves an offence under the Prevention of Corruption Act. He and other senior Judges and advocates demanded the need to be thoroughly probed, particularly to see how and to what extent they funded the activities and acquistion of assets of the Sabharwals. whether their acquisition can be legitimately explained. A call was made to the society to pressurize the Parliament and the government to bring a suitable Constitutional Amendment Bill for this purpose. 011 22756796, 9211530510 PNN , Delhi-91 ************************************************************** Scanned by eScan Anti-Virus and Content Security Software. Visit http://www.mwti.net for more info on eScan and MailScan. ************************************************************** From bijulaal at gmail.com Wed Aug 8 14:30:46 2007 From: bijulaal at gmail.com (Bijulal M.V.) Date: Wed, 8 Aug 2007 14:30:46 +0530 Subject: [Urbanstudy] : Plachimada Dtruggle enters a new phase: Solidarity Convention ISI, 10 August, 10 Am Message-ID: Dear friends All of you are aware of the Anti Coke struggle in Plachimada. Plachimada. Anti cola struggle front is a social collective opposing corporate exploitation as well as asserting constitutional and legal rights of the people, having representation from all political parties in the support structure of the movement. The struggle is entering to the fifth year. Changing the nature with an indefinite hunger strike from 15 August 2007 in front of the Factory. The Plachimada Solidarity Committee and the Delhi solidarity group (DSG) is joining together to emphasize the need of strengthening the struggle as well as seeking support from national and international audience, for the immediate closure of the company and compensation for corporate crimes in Plachimada. We are holding a meeting at Indian Social Institute Lodi Road, on 10 August 10 am to 2pm regarding this The main intentions of the meeting to inform more on the issue and the movement to share the experiences with similar movements and issues so that to get a wider on to corporate exploitation and failure of democratic institutions and policies Please do attend the meeting and CIRCULATE Bijulal MV 99 68 16 10 12 -- BIJULAL HUMAN RIGHTS & LAW UNIT INDIAN SOCIAL INSTITUTE LODI ROAD, NEW DELHI 110003 24622379 (O) 99 68 16 10 12 (MOB) From sebydesiolim at hotmail.com Mon Aug 13 20:34:20 2007 From: sebydesiolim at hotmail.com (sebastian Rodrigues) Date: Mon, 13 Aug 2007 20:34:20 +0530 Subject: [Urbanstudy] Women fighters from Bambolim battlefield Message-ID: August 13 2007 There are many of them but I got to meet only two of them. The first one is grand mother Kalyani Andrade who is engaged in defence of her land against take over by real estate lobby. Here is her picture link: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-browse_image.php?imageId=124 The second one is Teja Hadkondkar. She is an elected member of Bambolim-Talaulim-Curca-Nauxi Panchayat, Goa, India. Here she is actively battling the invaders: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-browse_image.php?imageId=126 These fighters deserves all the support and encouragement. Indeed they are role models for battle on land rights in Goa. And of course they are doing it in the interest on younger generation and generations yet to be born. Here is a child in the middle of the Battle as the builders want to raze down their house. They attempted it once. We all owe answer to this child: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-browse_image.php?imageId=136 This boy's family leaves in a beautiful house at Bambolim coast. They are are targeted and regularly harassed by the goons in uniforms and out of uniforms. Here is the picture of house that builders are preying upon: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-browse_image.php?imageId=129 While I went to support the people there, Aldeia de Goa's security personnel charged at me. They were demanding that I stop filming the injustice to people, rape of nature and transformation of Goa State as rubber stamp of builders and miners. Here is their security chief trying to stop me from filming: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-browse_image.php?imageId=125 And more security personnel was brought in to stop my camera, they could not: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-browse_image.php?imageId=131 New roads being constructed to the Bambolim beach. People's voices are sought to be throttled when they protested against this. Of course 146 acres of land for filthy rich needs new roads. If needed roads can be build over the people's houses, their bed rooms and even their dead bodies in near future: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-browse_image.php?imageId=130 Insult to the planet goes unabated: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-browse_image.php?imageId=139 And there are underground constructions possibly the swimming pools. Of course for those who are to buy their bungalows here at Aldea de Goa at the cost ranging between 0ne to five crore deserve the luxuries of life. Never mind this is going to cause complete disruptions to the lives of people in Bambolim and Nauxi villages : both tribal villages they are going to be erased. In any case Aldea de Goa believes that they have come to be elites with elites of Goa at Dona Paula. http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-browse_image.php?imageId=138 And they declare they have all the legal permissions for their rule of 'might is right': http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-browse_image.php?imageId=141 And just to remind you again as to who they are: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-browse_image.php?imageId=122 They have plenty of money; for their business is eco-crimes and community rights violations, they pay to chop, over 5000 coconut trees in the past few months. That landlord Sinari and others have no feelings for all this they got their bucks pockets full, secure for all their future generations. Their trickery in getting the land in their possession during Portuguese colonial times and later on in 'free' Goa paid of at last. http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-browse_image.php?imageId=133 The meaning of 'Aldeia' in Portuguese means 'village'. What sought of village is this that is being build upon livilihoods of People of Goa? Village whose conception is in rape of nature? Is it a village at all? You be the judge... Warmly, Seby Visit my blog at http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-view_blog.php?blogId=17 _________________________________________________________________ Best Shaadi proposals by email. Register now. http://ss1.richmedia.in/recurl.asp?pid=106 From mansilight at gmail.com Tue Aug 14 16:31:38 2007 From: mansilight at gmail.com (Meera (Mansi) Baindur) Date: Tue, 14 Aug 2007 16:31:38 +0530 Subject: [Urbanstudy] Lake Blog Message-ID: <998c34570708140401q12984edeg62bb6e7e50707202@mail.gmail.com> We created a blog of the third posting with pictures. Please take a look at it. Meera http://lakeprojecthebbalsarai.blogspot.com/ -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/urbanstudygroup/attachments/20070814/788d799b/attachment.html From cugambetta at yahoo.com Tue Aug 14 17:10:26 2007 From: cugambetta at yahoo.com (Curt Gambetta) Date: Tue, 14 Aug 2007 04:40:26 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Urbanstudy] Fw: interview with Christpher Benninger on Indian cities Message-ID: <343888.39978.qm@web56810.mail.re3.yahoo.com> Benninger's perspective is interesting... his observations and early planning work seem to head in one direction, while in the other direction he is beholden to master planning. I like the spirit of his early work, it would be interesting to see documentation of the projects (thanks for the heads up Leo) From: ESG India To: ECwatch ; urbanstudygroup at sarai.net; hasiruusiru at yahoogroups.com; Curt Gambetta ; Subbarayan Prasanna ; Bhargavi Rao ; Robert John Chandran Sent: Monday, August 13, 2007 12:47:36 PM Subject: [Fwd: `India simply has no urban plans`] http://www.business-standard.com/common/storypage_c.php?leftnm=10&autono=294076 `India simply has no urban plans` Gargi Gupta / New Delhi August 11, 2007 Award-winning architect Christopher C Benninger speaks to Gargi Gupta in a rare interview about his reason for staying on to work in India and his architectural interventions across Asia. Christopher Charles Benninger is a revered name among architects in India. An alumnus of Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s department of urban planning and Harvard University’s architecture school, where he later taught, Benninger came to India in 1968 on a Fulbright Fellowship and later as a Ford Foundation consultant. And stayed back. He set up the School of Urban Planning in Ahmedabad in 1971, together with Balkrishna V Doshi, and the Centre for Development Studies and Activities in Pune. Benninger, who set up an architectural studio in Pune in 1996, has designed a number of acclaimed structures, most notably the Mahindra United World College, which won an award from the American Institute of Architects, and made it to the final lists for the Aga Khan Award for Architecture Geneva, and The World Architecture Awards, Berlin. But more interestingly, Benninger is an authority on urban planning; he is a member of the governing council of the World Society of Ekistics, Athens and has advised the governments of India, Sri Lanka Bhutan, Malaysia, Indonesia and other countries, as also multilateral agencies like the Ford Foundation, World Bank, Asian Development Bank, UN-FAO, UN-ESCAP, UNICEF, UNCHS on urban planning and regional development plans. India is going through a real estate boom with buildings of every kind coming up all over the place. But architecturally, are they breaking any new ground? Architecture mirrors the society for which it is created. It is no better or no worse. The new economy in India is based on its becoming a world destination for out-sourcing, where cost-cutting is the client’s objective. But they want to do this with a global touch. Ninety percent of the projects are “cold shells”, where low budgets and fast track schedules are the design brief. Quality and beauty, and creating better places to live in, are not what people are doing because it is not the agenda in the first place. You were one of the first architects to work with HUDCO and other local urban development authorities, on housing for economically weaker sections. Can you describe the work you did? In the 1970s, I had the opportunity to design the first affordable housing scheme for economically weaker sections. Located in Jamnagar, it was a system of houses where each one had a WC, a tap, a room and a courtyard with a stair to the roof. In 1973, I introduced the concept of Site and Services (which I had developed as a student in Harvard, as my thesis). The idea was that poor families could build their own climatic protection, but they lacked the land tenure to allow upgradation, as also rudimentary services like storm water drains, street lights, potable water taps, sewerage connect and access lanes. My idea was that we provide what they cannot provide and they provide what they can! I was doing this under World Bank funding for the urban development authority at Chennai. This proved very successful as we could provide about 15,000 service plots at the same cost it would have taken to build 1,800 small houses! This idea was replicated by the World Bank globally. This is a case where India exported intellectual property to the world at no cost! The Bank just picked it up and ran! I worked with Dattatrey and Laxmanan (urban planners at the Madras Urban Development Authority) and we did it only for the thrill of solving problems. Later, we found a number of Washington-based “experts” claiming our invention as their own. In 1976, I prepared the first project for the Hyderabad Urban Development Authority in its first year of existence. I wanted to explore the concept that the secure urban poor could be the developers for the economically weaker section for whom rental shelter made more sense. So we laid out a township of 2,000 houses, amenities, shopping and open areas where the owners had a small core house with essential services on 100 sq m plots. What happened was that the owners quickly built more rooms and rented them out to still lower income groups (often relatives or village mates) at an affordable rent where the tenants used the sanitary infrastructure (increasing its efficiency by multiples) and the landlords harvested rents for loan payments and upgradation. These were three different and unique channels which gave access to the poor for housing. This is what I call “social architecture”. I also carried out large scale planning operations for the Mumbai Metropolitan Development Authority (mid-1980s) in Thane and in Kalyan. Generally, development plans only calculate the per capita needs for water, electricity and sewerage disposal and provide these at the trunk infrastructure level. This leaves out 70 per cent of the population who live in slums, sub-divided chawls and old structures. We turned this around and went directly to the users and worked out participatory strategies for common potable water taps, bathing places and WCs. At the other end of the scale, we looked at regional water resources, storm drainage networks and transport systems. By integrating these from both ends, a viable urban strategy was designed. In Thane, much of this was implemented in the early 1990’s, which turned around the city’s economy! This concept of slum up-gradation became a fourth channel providing access for the poor to shelter. Why are you still not doing this kind of work? First, I am interested in designing concepts and inventing ideas and not in becoming a factory producing housing! Second, I realised that one could have more impact on access to shelter than through construction. Our urban planning legislation was modelled on the British Garden Cities movement and these used wide boulevards, huge parks, immense house plots, single-function land use zoning and low density as yardsticks. I knew that neither the government, nor the urban poor, had the resources to follow this model. The answers to our problems rested in new laws, new town-planning standards, new philosophies and new principles. That is why I put down the Principles of Intelligent Urbanism, which became the basis for much of my recent planning work. What ails urban planning in India? …is that we do not have urban plans! We just have two dimensional plans marked with colors for land use restrictions and density restrictions. We link up building control regulations for different zones and call that a plan. These are merely restrictions on land development and not catalysts and enablers. A plan guides and facilitates development. Not only that, for cities like Pune the last development plan was prepared way back in the mid-1980s! This is criminal. Fast track cities like Hong Kong and Singapore have used extensive urban planning to assure economic development. In Singapore, all the land belongs to the government and is leased to the private sector for development within very clear urban design guidelines. Sixty percent of the people live in public, government-owned houses. In India we had the worst of capitalism and the worst of socialism! We are confused that the two are mutually exclusive! What we are doing in SEZs and business parks is just the beginning of a more viable system. But we do not have a viable system. There are rare exceptions to this like what is happening in Ahmedabad, where there is a strong private-public partnership and town planning schemes to provide a rational pattern for urban growth. Cities in India were totally neglected during the first 50 years of independence. There was no understanding that rural regions and cities are all one integrated system. We are now paying through congestion, pollution and unsanitary living standards. Good regional and urban planning is good business. No one understood this. In a way Indian cities disprove economic theory. It was always thought that economic growth follows the emplacement of economic and social infrastructure. Cities like Pune and Bangalore are growing despite serious infrastructure gaps! The events in West Bengal are not due to “pig headedness”! We have to learn from that experience and put people first! Good planning is participatory planning! Part of our problem today is that the graduates of business schools who have very narrow educations, they are arrogant regarding their limited knowledge and in their poor skills for consultative decision making. Why did it take you so long to set up your own studio? I never wanted to live off of the proceeds of an architectural studio. After all architecture is an art, not a business! All of my early works are for NGOs, voluntary workers, or for myself and institutions I was deeply involved in. Harish Mahindra drew me into running a larger studio by asking me to design the United World College of India, which won the American Institute of Architects Award 2000 and which fuelled our client list. Architects do need patrons to create. We need media coverage to meet patrons! Unless we are careful, it can become a vicious cycle of greed and money making. I have never chased after a client. I am arrogant with clients as far as they must know I am my own man, just like their heart surgeon will not just follow their orders! On the other hand, I am the servant of my clients and I have to keep their interests above all else! But I do not design for developers who will cut specs and pass on their sins to unknown end-users! It took me so long to set up my studio because I think it takes 40 or 50 years to learn the craft of architecture. I think I am still a student. My teachers are history, my craftsmen and my team members in the studio! Every new building is a new invention and we can carry into that process learning from the design before it and our earlier projects, but it is new and we have to be humble about it! Our clients are often represented by young managers who know nothing of the building process! They think one can create beauty in a month or a few weeks! This is an illness spreading like AIDS and we as professionals must educate the public about the disease! It is impacting the character of the urban fabric which nurtures us and which underpins the very creation of wealth we sustain ourselves upon. What has kept you in India for so long? I have always felt I am an Indian through and through! From the day I set foot in India, in 1968, I never felt strange or in an exotic place. I love India’s people, the landscape, the seasons, the dust, the heat, the dynamics, the food and even the chaos of the cities and the peace of the villages. When I feel out of place is when I step foot off a plane in America! Immediately I think, “When can I get out of here?” India has its own indigenous architecture, with concepts and designs more suited to local conditions. Do you incorporate elements of this in your designs? Architecture, good or bad, emerges from its context! One cannot incorporate elements really. Maybe one can decorate a building and make it look indigenous, which is a sham! One has to let designs emerge from the landscape, crafts people, materials and the client’s needs! All of these variables are Indian and thus my architecture is Indian! Even if I experiment in glass and in steel, it is my Indian curiosity about things new and things different. It is my Indian interest to bring outside things in and integrate everything into one huge pantheon of ideas and concepts. Territorial concerns Tell us about your consultancy work for South-east Asian countries? I have been involved in the preparation and analysis of plans for existing and new towns in Malaysia (Terengganu), Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Nepal and Bhutan at different levels. In Malaysia, I was pushing policy changes as the government was building new towns for the poor with such large plots and such high technical standards that these could never be handed over to the stake-holders for self management and local governance! Only if a patronising authority managed these towns could they survive with large subsidies. In Indonesia, I designed the shelter strategy for the rural poor as one of the corner stones of the first National Rural Development Programme. In Nepal, I designed an institutional system for local participation, micro-level panning and decentralised implementation. What is this project you are at present involved in in Bhutan? In Bhutan, I have prepared the physical plans and economic strategies for three new industrial areas that will piggy-back on the surplus power and new labour force emerging. We also prepared the new capital plan, designs for the capitol complex and key buildings in the complex. These are under construction. Perhaps of more interest are the 15 local area plans within the over-all structure plans in four cities in Bhutan. These plans are for compact urbanDEFANGED.3345> ----- Forwarded Message ----villages with all basic services and amenities. These are prepared with the involvement of local land owners in which they bank all their land, and after leaving aside 30 per cent for common facilities, are given back well laid out plots equal to 70 per cent of what they handed over. The trick? The new rectilinear plots with road access and basic services are worth five times what their original odd-shaped agricultural land was worth. ************************************************************** Scanned by eScan Anti-Virus and Content Security Software. Visit http://www.mwti.net for more info on eScan and MailScan. ************************************************************** ____________________________________________________________________________________ Need a vacation? Get great deals to amazing places on Yahoo! Travel. http://travel.yahoo.com/ From esg at bgl.vsnl.net.in Wed Aug 15 15:28:19 2007 From: esg at bgl.vsnl.net.in (ESG India (VSNL)) Date: Wed, 15 Aug 2007 15:28:19 +0530 Subject: [Urbanstudy] Parliament of India Q&A Bulletin XI.1 Message-ID: <46C2CE3B.7060602@bgl.vsnl.net.in> Dear All, Please find enclosed a compilation of questions being raised in the XI session of Parliament of India. The purpose of this bulletin is to help researchers and campaignists to closely follow developments in the Parliament on matters pertaining to economic, social and environmental justice issues in India. Our next bulletin will be disseminated when the Parliament website is updated. Any comments, queries and suggestions may kindly be send to Nandini (nandini at esgindia.org) who compiled this Bulletin. Best wishes Leo Saldanha Environment Support Group ************************************************************** Scanned by eScan Anti-Virus and Content Security Software. Visit http://www.mwti.net for more info on eScan and MailScan. ************************************************************** -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: POI_Q_A_BulletinXI.1_130807.rtf Type: application/msword Size: 116406 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/urbanstudygroup/attachments/20070815/d5f73401/attachment-0001.dot From esg at bgl.vsnl.net.in Thu Aug 16 15:00:37 2007 From: esg at bgl.vsnl.net.in (ESG India VSNL) Date: Thu, 16 Aug 2007 15:00:37 +0530 Subject: [Urbanstudy] [Fwd: Town planning flies out of the window] Message-ID: <46C4193D.2070906@bgl.vsnl.net.in> http://www.thehindu.com/2007/08/16/stories/2007081650230100.htm * Town planning flies out of the window * Afshan Yasmeen /Several loose ends as Government notifies rules on unauthorised constructions / — FILE Photo: V. Sreenivasa Murthy * /LEGALISING VIOLATIONS:/ Scenes such as this building being demolished in Bangalore will be a thing of the past. * BANGALORE: In what is being seen by citizens’ groups as a setback to regulated urban development, the State Government on Tuesday notified final rules for regularising unauthorised constructions by levying compounding fees. This has been done overlooking over 500 objections and suggestions from various civic organisations and even from the Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagara Palike (BBMP). Implications The implications of this move are far-reaching. Residential buildings with violations of up to 50 per cent and commercial buildings with deviations of up to 25 per cent can now be regularised by simply paying a fee. According to the rules, the compounding fee (penalty) ranges from Rs. 100 a square metre to Rs. 600 a sq. m depending on the size of the area and of the plot or building. The State Government amended the Karnataka Town and Country Planning and Other Laws Act, 2004 during its Belgaum session in September last year to facilitate regularisation. The draft rules were published on May 17 and the public was given a June 17 deadline to file objections and suggestions. Called the new Karnataka Town and Country Planning (Regularisation of Unauthorised Development or Constructions) Rules, 2007, the scheme will come into effect from September 15. Thereafter, violators of building bye-laws can benefit from the scheme in three months. The new rules will not only enable regularisation of building deviations but will also legalise change in land use. This means violations pertaining to setback, floor area ratio (FAR), change in land use and even basement parking can be regularised. Simply put, regulated town planning will fly out of the window. For example, a commercial unit in a quiet residential area can function without legal hurdles. Although the rules say that all this will be done keeping in mind the regulations in the Comprehensive Development Plan (CDP), it is not clear whether this refers to the revised Master Plan or the old CDP. The final rules specify the setting up of an appellate authority to oversee the decision of screening committees, define the competent authority and prescribe the payment of application scrutiny fee. Objections The draft rules had already caused some disquiet among civic groups who felt they would only encourage more people to become law-breakers. The groups apprehend that the rules would change the basic structure of a designated area (following change in land use) and affect the quality of life. The rules do not specify whether the regularisation is a one-time process or is continuous and in perpetuity. The Government has not stipulated a cut-off date after which no violations will be regularised. The rules are accessible only on the State Government website www.municipaladmn.kar . nic.in According to official sources, the implementation of the new rules will be difficult as there are several loose ends. These include issues pertaining to identifying, certifying and verifying the violations in buildings that have deviated more than the prescribed 50 per cent (residential) and 25 per cent (commercial). The rules do not provide for setting up a panel of architects to certify the violations. Some relief The only relief for the local bodies is that this scheme does not apply to buildings on encroached government land, valleys, drains, tank beds, lands that have high tension electrical lines, buildings under dispute, forest land and buildings coming in the alignment of a proposed road or rail network, the sources said. / / Printer friendly page ************************************************************** Scanned by eScan Anti-Virus and Content Security Software. Visit http://www.mwti.net for more info on eScan and MailScan. ************************************************************** -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/urbanstudygroup/attachments/20070816/15967c89/attachment-0001.html -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: 2007081650230101.jpg Type: image/jpeg Size: 26651 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/urbanstudygroup/attachments/20070816/15967c89/attachment-0001.jpg From sebydesiolim at hotmail.com Tue Aug 21 17:10:09 2007 From: sebydesiolim at hotmail.com (sebastian Rodrigues) Date: Tue, 21 Aug 2007 17:10:09 +0530 Subject: [Urbanstudy] Dempos swallows Bicholim town, villages Message-ID: Popularly known for thier generosity in promoting football in Goa, Dempo mining group is gradually swallowing Bicholim's precious resources. It has large number of mining leases in this taluka in Northen Goa. However Dempos have created hell like situation for the residents and farmers are forced to stop paddy on its fertile soil due to mining silts. Its roads are burdened with mining silt all the time and even dangerous during monsoon rains leading to large number of accident cases. In the non rainy days the air is full of nasty mining dust that has created large number people with severe health risks. In and around Bicholim town for example Dempo mining corporation has approximately 550 hactares of area under mining lease. It is spread out in the municipal limits of Bicholim Municipal corporation, Lamgao, villages of Mayem, Bordem, Mulgao and Sirigao. Even the public roads are within the mining lease of Dempos, one example to this effect is road from NSP Dempo Gate to Cine Hira Talkies in Bicholim town. Dempo mining has led to large scale water depletion as high voltage water sucking pumps are installed inside the mines to carry on deeper mechanised mining activities. Last month teacher Ramesh Gauns has filed police case for spreading silt on public roads in Bicholim and it is pending in the Court of the Executive Megistrate, Bicholim taluka, Bicholim. Dempos are responsible for causing irreversible threats to natural lakes in Mulgao as well as in Mayem due to its reckless mining activities. Natural water sources have gone dry in Pilgaon village. Its greening policies and nonesense as it promotes monocultures hostile to nature in every sense. Entire Bordem village is disrupted becuse of mining and landslides caused due to mining in 1991. The huge paddy field lies uncultivated and even people are displaced from thier original settlements. Here is a picture of Bordem mine and high powered water pump in operation for you to see: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-view_blog_post_image.php?imgId=4 All this for exports of Iron Ore first to Japan and in the last few years to China. Sebastian Rodrigues Visit my blog at http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-view_blog.php?blogId=17 _________________________________________________________________ Catch all the cricketing action right here. Live score, match reports, photos et al. http://content.msn.co.in/Sports/Cricket/Default.aspx From esg at bgl.vsnl.net.in Tue Aug 21 20:34:45 2007 From: esg at bgl.vsnl.net.in (ESG India VSNL) Date: Tue, 21 Aug 2007 20:34:45 +0530 Subject: [Urbanstudy] VERY IMPORTANT MEETING NOTICE FROM BBMP Message-ID: <46CAFF0D.2030408@bgl.vsnl.net.in> Dear All, Please find enclosed an invitation from the DCF (Tree Officer) Bruhat Blore Mahanagara Palike for a meeting that will decide the "removal" of trees for the Metro project and "developmental activities in BBMP area". In some ways it is a small victory of sorts, as this meeting is called despite the BBMP having issued orders to fell trees in Sheshadri Road, Palace Road, etc. A joint inspection by the Engineering Staff of BBMP (Road Widening division) and Tree Officer of BBMP along with ESG and CIVIC representatives, has probably resulted in this new thinking to consult the wide public. There is something very important to notice in the letter however: the description includes almost every tree in public and private lands in Bangalore city area. We need to have a formal, prepared and effective response to these proposals. The meeting is scheduled for Friday 24th August 2007, and it is a very important forum for us to utilise and bring some rationale and sense into the ongoing tree felling efforts (contrast this with the tree growing efforts of the government of the 1980s!). Sincerely Leo F. Saldanha Environment Support Group -------- Original Message -------- Subject: :SPAM: Meeting Notice Date: Tue, 21 Aug 2007 05:25:26 +0100 (BST) From: Deputy Conservator of Forests forests To: esg at esgindia.org *BRUHAT **BANGALORE ** MAHANAGARA PALIKE* No/DCF/PR- /07-08 Office of the Deputy Conservator of Forest Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagara Palike Bangalore. Dated: 17-08-07 *To,* Sri /Smt *Sir/Madam* * * *Sub*:- Review of removal of Trees for road widening and for * *Metro Rail Corporation Ltd. A meeting is convened *on **24-08-07 at 11.30 am* in the meeting hall No-1 of BBMP. The agenda of the meeting is as below. 1. Removal of trees for widening of road as per the instructions of Govt. 2. Removal of trees obstructing Metro rail Corporation works. 3. Removal of trees for developmental activities in BBMP area. You are requested to attend the meeting and to offer your valuable suggestions in the matter. Your truly Deputy Conservator of Forest Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagara Palike *Copy with complements communicated to:**-* * * 1. The Executive Engineer, (road works) Bangalore with request to attend the meeting on the said date. ************************************************************** Scanned by eScan Anti-Virus and Content Security Software. Visit http://www.mwti.net for more info on eScan and MailScan. ************************************************************** From esg at bgl.vsnl.net.in Thu Aug 23 15:34:21 2007 From: esg at bgl.vsnl.net.in (ESG India VSNL) Date: Thu, 23 Aug 2007 15:34:21 +0530 Subject: [Urbanstudy] Parliament of India Q & A Bulletin XI.2 Message-ID: <46CD5BA5.9070106@bgl.vsnl.net.in> Dear All, Please find enclosed the 2nd Bulletin in our series of XI Parliament Session Q & A updates service. The issues covered are indicated in the Indexes to Q & A (enclosed). We hope this compilation is of use to you. All comments, questions and feedback may kindly be sent to Nandini (nandini at esindia.org). Best wishes Leo Saldanha -- Environment Support Group (R) 105, East End B Main Road Jayanagar 9th Block East Bangalore 560069. INDIA Telefax: 91-80-26341977/26531339/26534364 Email: esg at esgindia.org or esg at bgl.vsnl.net.in Web: www.esgindia.org *Index to Questions* */ /* *Date* *Ministry Name* *Keywords in the question* *16 August 2007* *Ministry of Petroleum & Natural Gas * *Oil Exploration <#A1> * *Krishna Godavari basin project <#A2>* *Ship Recycling <#A3>* *Oil & Gas pricing <#A4>* *Promotion of non fossil fuel <#A5>* *16 August 2007* *Ministry of Chemical and Fertilizers* *Haldia petrochemical project <#A6>* *16 August 2007* *Ministry of Tourism* *Rural Tourism Scheme <#A7>* *16 August 2007* * * *Ministry of Railways* *Utilisation of surplus railway land <#A8>* *16 August 2007* *Ministry of Civil Aviation* *Devanahalli Airport <#A9>* *16 & 17 August 2007* * * *Ministry of Urban Development, Housing and Poverty alleviation* *Water supply schemes <#A10>* *Infrastructure development <#A11>* *JNNURM <#A12>* *Hyderabad Metro Rail <#A13>* *Bangalore <#A14>* *Delhi slums <#A15>* *Urban Housing policy <#A16>* *Slums <#A17>* *Right to Shelter <#A18>* *Urban poor <#A19>* *17 August 2007* *Ministry of Earth Sciences* *Soil erosion in coastal areas <#A20>* *Climatic Change <#A21>* *17 August 2007* *Ministry of Power* *Thermal projects <#A22>* *Hydropower projects <#A23>* *17 August 2007* *Ministry of Finance* *NGO Funds <#A24>* *Karnataka Finance Commission <#A25>* *World Bank loans <#A26>* *17 August 2007* *Ministry of Rural Development* *Karnataka Swajaldhara <#A27>* *SEZ <#A28>* *National Rehabilitation policy <#A29>* * * *17 August 2007* *Ministry of New & Renewable Energy* *Biofuels <#A30>* *17 & 20 August 2007* *Ministry of Agriculture* *Multi State World Bank project <#A31>* *SEZ <#A32>* *Kolleru Lake displacement <#A33>* *20 August 2007* *Ministry of Water Resources* *Interlinking of Rivers <#A34>* *Water resources <#A35>* *Upper Bhadra project <#A36>* *Kabini project <#A37>* *20 August 2007* *Ministry of Labour* *Contract Labour <#A38> * *17 August 2007* *Ministry of Health and Family Welfare* *World Bank <#A39>* *AIDS Bill <#A40>* *16 August 2007* *The Prime Minister* *Pruning of Central Schemes <#A41>* *Atomic Energy <#A42>* *Dumping of Waste <#A43>* *Climate Change <#A44>* *Forests & Wildlife <#A45>* *NLCP Karnataka <#A46>* *EIA Notification 2006 <#A47>* * * *Index to Answers* * * * * *Date* *Ministry Name* *Keywords in the question* *13 August 2007* *Ministry of Mines* *Illegal mining in Karnataka <#a1>* * * *Violation of Leasing Norms <#a2> * * * *Mining Projects in Andhra Pradesh <#Z1>* * * *13 August 2007* *Ministry of Social Justice & Empowerment* *Norms for aid to NGOS <#Z2>* *10 August 2007* *Ministry of Railways* *Train to Devanahalli airport <#Z3>* -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/urbanstudygroup/attachments/20070823/e284a95f/attachment-0001.html -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: POI_Q_A_BulletinXI.2_200807.rtf Type: application/msword Size: 121748 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/urbanstudygroup/attachments/20070823/e284a95f/attachment-0001.dot From elkamath at yahoo.com Fri Aug 24 08:04:12 2007 From: elkamath at yahoo.com (lalitha kamath) Date: Thu, 23 Aug 2007 19:34:12 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Urbanstudy] on the sub-prime crash Message-ID: <794971.65402.qm@web53612.mail.re2.yahoo.com> FYI OUT NOW ON METAMUTE.ORG: Living in a Bubble: Credit, Debt and Crisis - Mute Vol 2 #6 Panic in the credit markets! Sub-prime crash! The new issue of Mute is on the money and online soon. In Living in a Bubble: Credit, Debt and Crisis we look at the social costs of an era of debt-backed boom now showing signs of busting. As a downpayment on the future we are publishing some articles from the issue ahead of time... http://metamute.org * Fictitious Capital For Beginners: Imperialism, 'Anti-Imperialism', and the Continuing Relevance of Rosa Luxemburg By Loren Goldner The liquidity crisis currently wiping billions off global stock markets is just the tip of a very big iceberg. Beneath the credit crunch and incipient insolvency crisis lie the economic and political crisis of the USAâ€*s global reign, claims Loren Goldner. But will this mean global depression, wars and intensified authoritarianism, or a renewed opportunity for communism? Goldner returns to the theories of Marx and Luxemburg to examine today's financial and military imperialism, and its left wing â€*anti-imperialistâ€* mirror http://www.metamute.org/en/Fictitious-Capital-For-Beginners * Risky Business By Stanley Morgan With the prospect of earning over the odds on derivatives trading, hedge fund managers are employing ever more high-tech means to calculate risk and predict stock market activity. But Wall Streetâ€*s faith in its own predictive powers often blinds investors to the fundamental laws of investment, says risk specialist Stanley Morgan http://www.metamute.org/en/Risky-Business * Waiting For the End of the World By Jeff Strahl Would a financial crisis mean recession, depression or revolution? And havenâ€*t we been waiting a long time for this liberating, or devastating, catastrophe? Jeff Strahl surveys the prophets and naysayers and gives his own take on â€*a global crisis of unprecedented proportionsâ€* http://www.metamute.org/en/Waiting-For-the-End-of-the-World * The Three P's - Private Equity, PFI and Pensions by Rob Ray As money expands, society contracts. In the UK the unholy trinity of Private Finance Initiatives, Private Equity and Pensions embodies this logic, turning jobs, services and infrastructure into factories for finance capital. Rob Ray explains how the 3 P's interact to pile up corporate fortunes and devolve risk on to the rest of us http://www.metamute.org/en/The-3-Ps * The Magic of Debt, or Amortise This! Today we donâ€*t feel guilty about incurring debts, just the opposite – indebtedness is the entry price of being a good citizen, pulling more and more of us into the global financial system. Here Brett Neilson offers some philsophical and political tools for disowning a debt which can never be repaid http://www.metamute.org/en/The-Magic-of-Debt-or-Amortise-This * Speculating on Student Debt Far from being a right, British higher education in the age of top-up fees is a commodity with a hefty price tag attached. For most students, write the Committee for Radical Diplomacy, it offers a basic schooling in debt and recasts learning as a down-payment on a dubious future http://www.metamute.org/en/The-Magic-of-Debt-or-Amortise-This * OR SUBSCRIBE HERE: http://metamute.org/taxonomy/term/3480 FOR A LIST OF STOCKISTS: http://metamute.org/node/254 ____________________________________________________________________________________Ready for the edge of your seat? Check out tonight's top picks on Yahoo! TV. http://tv.yahoo.com/ -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/urbanstudygroup/attachments/20070823/5d797c8d/attachment.html From esg at bgl.vsnl.net.in Mon Aug 27 19:18:59 2007 From: esg at bgl.vsnl.net.in (ESG India VSNL) Date: Mon, 27 Aug 2007 19:18:59 +0530 Subject: [Urbanstudy] Parliament Q & A Bulletin Xi.3_240807 Message-ID: <46D2D64B.4030709@bgl.vsnl.net.in> Dear All Please find enclosed the 3rd Bulletin of Q & A in the Parliament Q & A series. We wil appreciate feedback on the utility of tihs compilation. Please email nandini at esgindia.org in this regard. Thank you Leo Saldanha -- Environment Support Group (R) 105, East End B Main Road Jayanagar 9th Block East Bangalore 560069. INDIA Telefax: 91-80-224441977/26531339/26534364 Email: esg at esgindia.org or esg at bgl.vsnl.net.in Web: www.esgindia.org -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: POI_Q_A_BulletinXI.3_240807.rtf Type: application/msword Size: 187536 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/urbanstudygroup/attachments/20070827/562ab512/attachment-0001.dot From sebydesiolim at hotmail.com Tue Aug 28 21:41:31 2007 From: sebydesiolim at hotmail.com (sebastian Rodrigues) Date: Tue, 28 Aug 2007 21:41:31 +0530 Subject: [Urbanstudy] Indian Environment and Forest Ministry betrays Sarwan, Goa Message-ID: Ministry of Environment and Forest (MoEF) over ruled all the objections of the Sarvan villagers and gave green signal for starting of mining legally to Goa bussiness group of Zatye but actually to be operated by on Trimurthy. It is 72 hactares Sarwan Iron Ore and Manganese Ore Mine. Villagers and People concerned about Environment have been protesting the commisioning of mine at Sarwan for past few years. Last August 05 2007 core area - survey number 64 of T.C. No. 28/1953 - of mining went under the flooded Bicholim River. Here is the picture taken then: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-view_blog_post_image.php?imgId=28 Environment ministry in its decision dated 21 August 2007 granted permission to M/s Zatye & Company Pvt. Ltd the necssarry environment clearance for commisining of mine under the condition that keeps safety zone of 50 meters between mine working and the Bicholim river. The travesty of truth is that thare is no 50 meter distance between the border as visible in the above picture and the Bicholim river. This mine is proposed to be commisioned at the capital cost of Rs.278 lakh and will generate the waste of 13.1 million tonnes out of which 10 million will be dumped on the land in the form of overburden and the rest will be dumped inside the mining pit. The clearance to the Sarvan mine also mean 40 houses with about 100 Sarwan villagers living adjacent to the mining lease land of survey number 99 in survey number 102 will have to get out soon if they decide to accept the verdict of MoEF. MoEF is satisfied with its investigations and found that this mine was in operation during Portuguese colonial times in mid 1950s. Half a century later Indian government thinks it fit to revive the same - thus perpetualte the neo colonial legacy. In early 2007 villagers came out the street of Bicholim to protest the mining proposal. Here is the picture a protestor: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-view_blog_post_image.php?imgId=34 Soon the public hearing was held wherein the mining proposal was vehemently opposed. Here is the picture of gathering at Public hearing: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-view_blog_post_image.php?imgId=35 MoEF gave permision for mining in not only roughriding Peoples opposition for mining but also neglecting topographic evidence of forest existing the mining lease area. Here is the picture of Sarvan's fragile Forest: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-view_blog_post_image.php?imgId=36 There is also very important underground Cave network in the proposed Sarwan mine area jurisdiction. This is going to be completely lost forever to the planet: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-view_blog_post_image.php?imgId=37 Proposed Zatye mining site in Sarvan also has an old temple - a place of worship on the banks. It is a rich human heritage to be lost due to mining. See the beauty for yourself: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-view_blog_post_image.php?imgId=38 Hoticulture in the form of 'Kulagars' here fetch Rs. 1 crore to the Sarvan village. It has well developed irrigation networks. Have a look at this irrigation for cultivation: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-view_blog_post_image.php?imgId=39 In the hottest months in Goa temperature in this forest does ranges between 15 degrees to 28 degree. It is forest with wild flowers. Here is picture: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-view_blog_post_image.php?imgId=40 Cattles too come here to cool themselves in fresh water. Here they are relaxing: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-view_blog_post_image.php?imgId=41 Do you think mining should come up in Sarvan? Dont's we rob our future generations of somethings valuable? What answer do we have to offer when he will ask us 'Why din't you protect our mountains?' Do we have a courage to look at his face: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-view_blog_post_image.php?imgId=42 Sarwan forest will loose Forest, Villages of Sarvan and Vattadev, Will deposit huge silt in Bicholim river, will throughly disturb catchment area of Bicholim river which is an important tributories of Mandovi river. Do ponder. Think. Then write your protests to the MoEF officials in Delhi at their email plahujarai at yahoo.com Express yourself so your till your voice is heard by those in power. Sebastian Rodrigues Visit my blog at http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-view_blog.php?blogId=17 _________________________________________________________________ Catch all the cricketing action right here. Live score, match reports, photos et al. http://content.msn.co.in/Sports/Cricket/Default.aspx From priya at cm.sarai.net Thu Aug 30 10:00:36 2007 From: priya at cm.sarai.net (Priya Sen) Date: Thu, 30 Aug 2007 10:00:36 +0530 Subject: [Urbanstudy] Nanocity outside Chandigarh? - from Gautam Bhan Message-ID: <46D647EC.7010501@cm.sarai.net> Dear All, This is my first posting on the list but I wanted to write in and see what you all know about Nanocity, a proposed 11,000 "metropolis" being built 20km or so outside Chandigarh by Sabeer Bhatia, the Hotmail millionairre. I'm a student at UC berkeley here in the US in the urban planning program, and people here are involved in the design of this city, which seems to have land clearance from the governent and is claiming to be ready by 2012 at the cost of over $1bn. Now, in India and the Indian press, I haven't seen much or any public dialogue about this - -for a project of this magnitude it strikes me as odd because it seems to be going much beyond the IT park/SEZ/Township models that we're used to, and I'm wondering why there is such silence about it. There must be issues of diplacement of people and land use involved, without even talking about what it means for a private millionairre to decide to build a "21st century metropolis." Can anyone enlighten? If everyone else is as much out of the loop as I have been, I think its time we start taking Mr Bhatia's plan seriously and trying to understand what's apparently going on in our backyard. best, Gautam From samirfayaz at yahoo.com Fri Aug 31 04:24:33 2007 From: samirfayaz at yahoo.com (Samir Shaikh) Date: Thu, 30 Aug 2007 15:54:33 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Urbanstudy] Deccan Traverses: The Making of Bangalore's Terrain Message-ID: <630160.8819.qm@web34615.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Has anyone read this book? Any opinions? Deccan Traverses: The Making of Bangalore's Terrain by Anuradha Mathur and Dilip Da Cunha New Delhi: Rupa, 2006 Here's a review in the Harvard Design Magazine (also see attached pdf) source: http://www.gsd.harvard.edu/research/publications/hdm/current/26_Correa.html): - Samir Shaikh Reviewed by Felipe Correa Deccan Traverses: The Making of Bangalore's Terrain by Anuradha Mathur and Dilip Da Cunha New Delhi: Rupa, 2006 Deccan Traverses: The Making of Bangalore’s Terrain presents a thoroughly unique reading of Bangalore, India’s “Garden City,” and the multiple intellectual and material constructs that have shaped it. Furthermore, the scope and ambition of the work presented in the book (which parallels an exhibition that opened in India and Philadelphia), goes beyond Bangalore itself—it questions the role of landscape architecture as a last act of design and reframes it as a basic initiator of settlement. This intriguing view of the Indian city and its multiple forms of urbanism pointedly criticizes India’s time-honored reliability on the imported master plan exemplified by erroneous interpretations of Le Corbusier’s Chandigarh or the most recent TVA-inspired Tehri Dam in northern India. As a potential alternative, India-born, Philadelphia-based designers Anuradha Mathur and Dilip Da Cunha propose an inventive use of the diagram as a transformative tool that can distill and restructure an array of organizational systems already at play within an extended urban field where the boundaries between consolidated city and open territory are hard or impossible to define. Always resisting the most straightforward and obvious historical associations, the authors go beyond the everyday life of Bangalore and dig into the material qualities that are imperceptible to the naked eye but can be rendered visible through multiple mapping techniques. In doing so, they construct a “thick” visual and written narrative that goes back more than three hundred years to trace the most significant colonial enterprises that have motivated this terrain to transmute from “Naked Country” to “Garden City” and most recently to a “Technology Capital.” Mathur and Da Cunha’s inventive work cuts through multiple agencies and actions that throughout time have been taken to represent Bangalore’s material and cultural milieu. They reassemble the city into a set of animate fields that depict a wide range of ongoing negotiations between an aggregation of historic and current social and political pressure systems and the different geographies/geometries ubiquitous to each. As one travels through the rich accumulation of archival and cartographic material, one encounters an elaborate array of images, drawings, mappings, and diagrams that go beyond the fixed conventions of visual logic and the use of normative symbols. The work aggressively favors representational tools that are deeply infused by the ecologies being explored, yet it remains faithful to the interpretative and transformational strength of architectural modes of representation. As the work moves from the realm of the real into the representational, each terrain is intensely thickened by a well-calibrated injection of material and cultural events, resulting in a critical redefinition of the burrowed site, and the surfacing of the multiple entities that compose it. The Scope and ambition of the work presented in the book, goes beyond Banglore itself—it questions the role of landscape architecture as a last act of design and reframes it a a basic initiator of settlement. Perhaps the most significant claim made in the project is that Bangalore is as a much a cultivated eye as it is a cultivated land. The authors, by revisiting many of the most salient historical milestones of the city, astutely capture the dual nature of the multiple expeditions that slowly transformed this territory into India’s Garden City. If the initial objective of these extraordinary pioneers was either to exploit the territory, in the case of the East India Company, or to set forth projects of global significance, such as measuring the curvature of the earth or documenting local cultural ways, each of these actions had a primordial role in the emergence of this landscape. All these actions left significant physical and cultural imprints in the region. The steady accretion of imported measurements, materials, skills, and images slowly amalgamated into a physical-material construct that makes up contemporary Bangalore. A highly significant example is the many surveyor drawings of Bangalore. Even though these maps were originally done in behalf of for the East India Company, they had a much broader impact in the local culture—they were the most precise and effective records of the city’s morphology and served as a primary resource for decades to come. The most intriguing issues in the book emerge from the authors’ ability to go beyond individual colonial undertakings and construct a visual profile that selectively imbricates the contents of the different expeditions and discoveries that have unfolded throughout the last four centuries. In doing so, they highlight their active role in the shaping of the physical and dynamic structures of the terrain. War, Surveying, Picturing, and Botanizing are the four main chapters in the book and reveal the most salient actions that have shaped Bangalore and the broader Deccan Plateau; these are imaginatively appropriated by the authors to inform the book’s “the sites to be investigated.” War: This section documents the first set of urbanistic actions, military in this case, which defined the foundation and growth of Bangalore. Its development is staged as a highly animate material event rather than a bound spatial entity. In doing so, Mathur and Da Cunha rigorously challenge the traditional definition of the Maidan (an open area in or near a town, often used for collective events) as a fixed spatial type. Furthermore, they reconstruct it as a field condition that throughout history has accommodated the unfolding of a mixed set of urban events with varied intensities and rhythms. Even today, the Maidan continues to act as the most significant public realm within the Bangalorean collective. This particular point is exquisitely profiled in two large-format silkscreen prints that carefully single out and calibrate the morphological changes of the four main roads that define the origins of the city and that throughout the years have served as a backdrop for a wide array of urban events. Survey: This section reconstructs the multiple geodesic expeditions that traversed this territory and single out their agency in establishing an infrastructural framework that goes beyond the specific artistic/scientific objectives of the mission itself. British explorers established various measuring devices that brought together a wide set of physical and social dynamics into a single picture plane. Through multiple cartographic devices, including triangulation, explorers could effectively track diachronically the fluctuations of fluvial systems, climatic variations, and the proliferation of diseases and their potential medicines. The authors critically reframe the expeditioner’s role as a generator of an abstract infrastructural machine that can simultaneously track and inform a broad set of physical and social dimensions. Ultimately, the findings of the expeditioners laid out a latent infrastructure that played a significant role in the urban forms adopted by future settlers. Resisiting the most straightforward and obvious historical associations, the authors go beyond the everyday life of Bangalore and dig into the material qualities that are imperceptible to the naked eye but can be rendered visible through multiple mapping techiniques. Picture: This section engages Picturesque Painting, a nascent genre in 18th-century England, as an art form that holds an inherent potential to serve as both an aesthetic and a scientific practice. The authors focus on the latter, and redefine it as a significantly effective device able to isolate, archive, and transplant elements within the landscape, creating an effective visual survey of the terrain at play. In re-traversing the grounds explored primarily by British artist Thomas Daniell, the authors re-present the multiple elements that make up Bangalore’s ground, singling out the most significant material constructs in the city. One of the most compelling stories told in this portion of the book reveals how the plethora of small bodies of water, ubiquitous to current Bangalore and perceived as an original ecology in the city, are in reality an artificial hydrologic network that tailored the grounds for denser settlement and agricultural production. Every tank is both an individual entity and a key player in a much broader hydrological/political system; the result is a checkerboard of disrupted ownerships. Garden: This section uses the Lalbagh, the most prominent public garden in the city, as a point of departure for a visual and textual narrative that effectively conveys the complex botanical matrix that has resulted from the introduction, acclimatization, and dissemination of the flora that today make up Bangalore’s botanical carpet. The book astutely reveals how Bangalore, by serving as a “botanical depot” that deliberately collected flora from geographies as far away as South America, slowly transformed from “naked country” to “garden city.” The narrative further describes social practices that emerged from botanical explorations and depicts how these are still active in everyday Bangalore. As the heavily saturated pages of this volume permeate our active perception, two broader questions arise: What is the significance of “exhibition” as a critical form of practice in this particular context and in the design disciplines at large? Does this disciplinary endeavor generate enough traction to critically engage, intervene, and induce a larger transformation in Bangalore’s terrain? The authors are conspicuously silent about both questions, and perhaps the tentative success of their form of practice lies in the abstract, yet generative manner in which they address the potentiality of design in a context where top-down interventions seem not to affect the intrinsic material forces of the city. On the one hand, through the introduction of a large number of synthetic drawings, the book goes beyond its archival origins and cleverly transcends the boundaries of mute documentation. On the other, Mathur and Da Cunha intentionally stop short of synthesizing their findings in concrete design proposals for Bangalore and the broader Deccan Plateau. As an alternative to “pure notation” or a “finite project,” the authors seem to appropriate a middle ground that claims the diagram as an essential tool that can fuel the transition from the archival act of documentation into a speculative act of design. It is through the authors’ ability to endorse engagement rather than objectification that this project can successfully cast significant influence in Bangalore’s design community at large, and in doing so fuel a greater degree of awareness towards of their most immediate environment. Acting as a Deluzian transgressive device, this seamless accretion of interpretative drawings specifies particular operations that negotiate between Bangalore’s semi-consolidated urban matter and its abundance of unfastened activities. More importantly, by being simultaneously determinate and indeterminate, these depictions also allow a space for active viewers to ask critical questions from a fresh vantage point and use this work as a vehicle to reinterpret their most immediate pedestrian realities. For example, the reexamination of former triangulation measurements reveals a very clear attitude towards the region’s topography and can shed significant light on infrastructural projects and how these can be tailored to better fit this rugged terrain. Mathur and Da Cunha cleverly allow induction to displace deduction to provide an ample cultural and physical framework that can provoke and inform future urban transformations and tactically hint at specific projects. Through the instrumental use of the diagram, the authors can reveal unfamiliar relationships among highly familiar objects, and in doing so propose a world other than what exists: a flipside cosmos that allows for new realities, and in doing so, sets forth an alternative method that can help us move away from the most aphasic forms of development that seem to dominate Bangalore’s and many other current urban scenarios. ____________________________________________________________________________________ Looking for a deal? Find great prices on flights and hotels with Yahoo! FareChase. http://farechase.yahoo.com/ -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/urbanstudygroup/attachments/20070830/0d108f44/attachment-0001.html -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: 26_Correa.pdf Type: application/pdf Size: 54898 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/urbanstudygroup/attachments/20070830/0d108f44/attachment-0001.pdf From nath at computer.org Fri Aug 31 22:49:37 2007 From: nath at computer.org (CPC) Date: Fri, 31 Aug 2007 10:19:37 -0700 Subject: [Urbanstudy] Nanocity outside Chandigarh? - from Gautam Bhan In-Reply-To: <46D647EC.7010501@cm.sarai.net> References: <46D647EC.7010501@cm.sarai.net> Message-ID: Here are the references to nanocity. With so much in the news, how can you say, media is quiet. regards chandra Overseas Indian: Connecting India with its Diaspora *Sabeer Bhatia* to set up *Nanocity*. *Chandigarh*, Sep 01: Sabir *Bhatia*, who revolutionised e-mailing, will help the Haryana government set up a Rs.50 billion *...* www.overseasindian.in/2006/sept/news/news3.shtml - 21k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this *Sabeer Bhatia* - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia *Sabeer* was born in *Chandigarh*, India in 1968. His father, Baldev *Bhatia *, *...* The aim of *Nanocity* is to replicate the vibrance and eco-system of innovation *...* en.wikipedia.org/wiki/*Sabeer*_*Bhatia* - 23k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this India eNews - *Sabeer Bhatia* to help set up *Nanocity* in Haryana *Chandigarh* - Sabir *Bhatia*, who revolutionised e-mailing, will help the Haryana government set up a Rs.50 billion ($1.07 billion) *Nanocity* - an infotech part *...* www.indiaenews.com/business/20060901/20609.htm - 23k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this *[PDF]* *Sabeer Bhatia* to help set up *Nanocity* in HaryanaFile Format: PDF/Adobe Acrobat - View as HTML *Sabeer Bhatia* to help set up *Nanocity* in Haryana. *Chandigarh* - Sabir * Bhatia*, who revolutionised e-mailing, will help the Haryana government set up a *...* www.indiaenews.com/pdf/20609.pdf - Similar pages- Note this *Sabeer Bhatia* to help set up *Nanocity* in Haryana : India *Chandigarh*, Aug 31 Sabir *Bhatia*, who revolutionised e-mailing, will help the *...* *Chandigarh* |10 months ago *Sabeer Bhatia* to help set up * Nanocity* in Haryana *...* www.nerve.in/news:25350014170 - 35k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this India CurrentsSee how *Sabeer Bhatia*'s new line, *Nanocity*, tends to be a conversation stopper at *...* At 11000 acres, *Nanocity*, 16 miles southeast of * Chandigarh* (*Bhatia*'s *...* www.indiacurrents.com/news/view_article.html?article_id=d6ae69127f652b47ab64f742229d1e03&from=rss- 35k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this *Sabeer Bhatia* to help set up *Nanocity* in Haryana | Indian Muslims *Sabeer Bhatia* to help set up *Nanocity* in Haryana. Posted August 31st, 2006 by aftababedin. Economy. *Chandigarh*, September 1 (IANS) Sabir *Bhatia *, *...* www.indianmuslims.info/news/2006/september/01/economy/*sabeer*_*bhatia* _to_help_set_up_*nanocity*_in_haryana.html - 15k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this *Sabeer Bhatia* to help set up *Nanocity* in Haryana *Sabeer Bhatia* to help set up *Nanocity* in Haryana. *Chandigarh*, September 1 (IANS) Sabir *Bhatia*, who revolutionised e-mailing, will help the Haryana *...* www.indianmuslims.info/book/export/html/6778 - 3k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this Nano City - *Sabeer Bhatia* *Sabeer Bhatia*. The co-founder of Hotmail, *Sabeer* is best described as a "lifelong *...* in a new city called "Nano City" - to be built outside of * Chandigarh*. *...* www.*nanocity*.in/promoters.html - 11k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this *Sabeer Bhatia* plans Nano city for Haryana by Charanjit Ahuja *...* *nanocity*.in. VISION DESIGN PHILOSOPHY INFRASTRUCTURE GOALS PROGRESS THE PROMOTERS. HOME IDEAS FROM YOU FEEDBACK, CONTACT US PRESS LINKS PICTURE GALLERY *...* www.*nanocity*.in/press-media-links/*sabeer*-*bhatia*- plans-nano-city-for-haryana.html - 6k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this Did you mean to search for: *Nano city*, Chandigarh by Sabeer Bhatia *Sabeer Bhatia* blog,*Sabeer Bhatia* web site blog,*Sabeer Bhatia* *...*14. Comment on Where is *Sabeer Bhatia* ? by JBN Well the plans of building * nanocity* will be in graveyard soon because of politics that is occuring in Haryana *...* www.peopleandprofiles.com/ProfileLinks-28/*Sabeer*+*Bhatia*.html?profile_id=156&type=blog&movie=&st=0 - 34k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this *Sabeer Bhatia* links,*Sabeer Bhatia* web site links,*Sabeer Bhatia* *...* *Sabeer Bhatia* to help set up *Nanocity* in Haryana - India News ... * Chandigarh*, Aug 31 (IANS) Sabir *Bhatia*, who revolutionised e-mailing, will help . *...* www.peopleandprofiles.com/.../*Sabeer*+*Bhatia*.html?profile_id=156&type=link&st=60&linkid=28 - 31k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this *Sabeer Bhatia*, The Man Behind Hotmail -Googling India *Sabeer Bhatia* was born in *Chandigarh* in the year 1969. *...* planning to build a new city in Haryana, India called Nano city at http://www.*nanocity*.in . *...* www.googling.in/.../great_indian_business_legends/*sabeer*_*bhatia*_the_man_behind_hotmail.html - 31k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this The Tribune, *Chandigarh*, India - BusinessHSIIDC, *Sabeer Bhatia* ink pact *Chandigarh*, November 1 *....* has earlier been cleared by the Haryana Investment Promotion Board christened as '*Nanocity*.IN'. *...* www.tribuneindia.com/2006/20061102/biz.htm - 61k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this The Tribune, *Chandigarh*, India - Haryana *Chandigarh*, August 31 *Sabeer Bhatia*'s latest IT venture — Nano City — will *....* A special purpose vehicle, *Nanocity*.in, would be formed by the HSIIDC and *...* www.tribuneindia.com/2006/20060901/haryana.htm - 58k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this *Sabeer Bhatia* The pioneer in the field of web based e-mail service *Sabeer Bhatia* was born in 1969 in *Chandigarh*, India to Indian Army officer father Baldev *Bhatia* and *...* www.indianetzone.com/5/*sabeer*_*bhatia*.htm - 21k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this My Articles: *Sabeer Bhatia* *Sabeer* was born in 1969 at *Chandigarh* to Balev *Bhatia* & Daman *Bhatia*. *....* The aim of *Nanocity* is to replicate the vibrance and eco-system of innovation *...* sachi-writer.blogspot.com/2007/04/*sabeer*-*bhatia*.html - 78k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this Hotmail co-founder helping India to create forward-looking cityIf *Sabeer Bhatia's* vision comes true, 5000 acres of Himalayan foothills could *...* India near the city of his birth, *Chandigarh*, in the state of Haryana. *...* news-service.stanford.edu/news/2006/october4/*bhatia*-100406.html - 13k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this Gurgaon Community Portal || News, Views, Reviews, Comments *...* *Sabeer Bhatia* plans for *nanocity* in rural region of panchkula would be highly *...* The whole belt of *chandigarh*, panchkula, *nanocity* in barwala/raipur, *...* www.gurgaonscoop.com/story/2007/4/23/2736/63722 - 58k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this Nano City hots up realty pricesWith *Sabeer Bhatia*-promoted Nano City proposed at the sleepy township of Raipur Rani *...* Talking to Newsline, Naval *Bhatia*, Director, *Nanocity*.in Developers *...* cities.expressindia.com/fullstory.php?newsid=246070 - 41k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this Nano City 12), *Sabeer Bhatia*plans Nano city for Haryana by Charanjit Ahuja, *Chandigarh* The Financial Express (05/04/2006). 13), *Bhatia* in Nano City, full steam for *...* www.*nanocity*.com/press-links.html - 17k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this The Hindu : Other States / Haryana News : Nano City to come upIt will be better then the Silicon Valley, says *Sabeer Bhatia* *...* Mr. Hooda said that a special purpose vehicle called *nanocity*.in would be formed by the *...* www.hindu.com/2006/09/01/stories/2006090104860500.htm - 19k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this The Hindu : Other States / Haryana News : Deal inked for knowledge *...* *CHANDIGARH*: The Haryana State Industrial and Infrastructure Development Corporation *...* *Sabeer Bhatia* of Hotmail fame, in the presence of Haryana Financial *...* www.hindu.com/2006/11/02/stories/2006110206650500.htm - 18k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this CRGP News *...* *Chandigarh* and Sahara's Aamby Valley (Lonavala) in India. It further investigates the upcoming urban developments like *Sabeer Bhatia's Nanocity* *...* crgp.stanford.edu/news/atom.xml - 49k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this Date:01/09/2006 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2006/09/01/stories *...*It will be better then the Silicon Valley, says *Sabeer Bhatia* *...* Hooda said that a special purpose vehicle called *nanocity*.in would be formed by the HSIIDC *...* www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/thscrip/print.pl?file=2006090104860500.htm&date=2006/09/01/&prd=th&- 7k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this *Chandigarh*, Panchkula & Mohali and sorroundings [Archive *...*I also belong to *chandigarh*, we should see the interest level and think about doing something *.....* *Nanocity* (*Sabeer Bhatia*): Big plans for PKL. *...* www.r2iclubforums.com/clubvb/archive/index.php/t-601.html - 52k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this Nanobiotechnology in India : Nanobiotech Activity in India (Aug *...*Venture Activity July 18 2006, Gurgaon: *Sabeer Bhatia* of 'Hotmail ' fame is investing $10 Billion into the setting up of a' *NanoCity*' *...* nanobioindia.sulekha.com/blog/post/2006/08/nanobiotech-activity-in-india-aug-2006.htm- 48k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this did you know hotmail is by an indian - Uyirvani Forum AR rahman *...* *Sabeer Bhatia* founded Hotmail Biography *Sabeer* was born in *Chandigarh*, India, *...* is to build a new city in India called Nano city at www.* nanocity*.in. *...* www.uyirvani.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=16127&mode=threaded&pid=687271 - 85k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this Gurgaon Community Portal || News, Views, Reviews, Comments *...* *Sabeer Bhatia* is planning *nanocity* in Pkl. 2.) Panchkula tech park is upcoming new project. 3.) Even *Chandigarh* IT park which is developing very fast, *...* www.gurgaonscoop.com/story/2007/4/24/234546/346 - 60k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this قصة مخترع الهوت ميل - Future Movement - Almustaqbal- [ Translate this page] *Sabeer* was born in *Chandigarh*, India in 1969 to typical middle class parents. His father, Balev *Bhatia*, worked in the Indian Ministry of Defence while his *...* www.futuremovement.org/forum/showthread.php?t=17312 - 91k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this On 8/29/07, Priya Sen wrote: > > Dear All, > > This is my first posting on the list but I wanted to write in and see > what you all know about Nanocity, a proposed 11,000 "metropolis" being > built 20km or so outside Chandigarh by Sabeer Bhatia, the Hotmail > millionairre. I'm a student at UC berkeley here in the US in the urban > planning > program, and people here are involved in the design of this city, > which seems to have land clearance from the governent and is claiming > to be ready by 2012 at the cost of over $1bn. > > Now, in India and the Indian press, I haven't seen much or any public > dialogue about this - -for a project of this magnitude it strikes me as > odd because it seems to be going much beyond the IT park/SEZ/Township > models that we're used to, and I'm wondering why there is such silence > about it. > > There must be issues of diplacement of people and land use involved, > without even talking about what it means for a private millionairre to > decide > to build a "21st century metropolis." > > Can anyone enlighten? If everyone else is as much out of the loop as I > have been, I think its time we start taking Mr Bhatia's plan seriously and > trying to understand what's apparently going on in our backyard. > > best, > Gautam > _______________________________________________ > Urbanstudygroup mailing list > Urban Study Group: Reading the South Asian City > > To subscribe or browse the Urban Study Group archives, please visit > https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/urbanstudygroup > -- ================================================== Please avoid sending me Word or PowerPoint attachments. See http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/no-word-attachments.html ================================================== Chandra Nath, 01edge technologies, 6830 Woodley Ave #4, Van Nuys, CA 91406, USA http://01edge.com/ Phone: 310 882 1945 email: nath at computer.org _______________________________ IMPORTANT NOTICE: This email message including any attachments is legally privileged, confidential and is for the use of the individual or entity to whom it is addressed. Any unauthorized review, use, disclosure or distribution is expressly prohibited. If you have received this email message in error, please immediately notify us by email and destroy all copies of the message. Thank you. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/urbanstudygroup/attachments/20070831/0c7d9df7/attachment-0001.html From kartiknair at gmail.com Wed Aug 1 00:25:34 2007 From: kartiknair at gmail.com (Kartik Nair) Date: Wed, 1 Aug 2007 00:25:34 +0530 Subject: [Urbanstudy] Appu Ghar: Anxiety of Amusement [Posting III] Message-ID: <83898cc70707311155g5895b52cn9e86017fb72f8167@mail.gmail.com> Following is a report of my meeting with the reputed creator of Appu Ghar, Sharat Das. MYTH OF ORIGINS? **6.40 P.M. 16 July 2007 After my total failure to navigate the hostile urban labyrinth that is New Friends Colony [that could be a whole different paper], a helpful intern from Sharat Das's obscure office building leads me to it, my car trailing his motorbike. A rebrick façade gives way to an appreciably older, more worn interior in which files and dead air are stacked around people stacked around insufficiently lit desks. An unassuming man of unimposing proportions, Sharat Das has stepped out of his private office to take a smoke. As we return to his table, Mr Das takes the lead by apologizing for a show of endless tobacco conflagration that shall, somewhere further down this page, saturate the air with its indistinction. I had expected Sharat Das to be many things, but chain-smoker I did not anticipate. Could he be that hero, the long-forgotten donor figure, Dilli's Willy [Wonka]? Was this the man who cracked an iron-willed Prime Minister with a little idea for a children's park? "She had a coy smile on her face" he recalls, with the clarity of someone whose best years are behind him, and who is now revisiting a hallowed hall in the back-lot of his mind. "She said to me, 'Mr Das, what would you like me to do?' I didn't hesitate. There were customs and excise duties and entertainment taxes, and I said, 'Madam, the children of my country cannot afford these things.' I remember it precisely": within minutes, a brief phone call to her private secretary connected Sharat Das to Pranab Mukherjee's office at the Ministry of Commerce. In five minutes Indira Gandhi had helped flip the switch on Sharat Das's interesting and unprecedented vision for what he called 'the backyard of Pragati Maidan'. "That night I had six drinks instead of three" he confesses with disarming heartiness. "But there was just one thing that bothered me…" The Prime Minister had asked for a *favour*. Instead of the simply adequate (if somewhat generic) charms of the name 'Amusement Park', she had suggested christening the project 'Appu Ghar'. As the beloved mascot and a frequently extrapolated, commercially viable element of the Asian Games design, Appu had something all enduring brands seek: affirmative recall value. Mr Das: "Only much later did I realize the simple genius of it…She [Gandhi] had been talking in the terms of brand equity in a time before it existed." That was the end of August. The park was scheduled to open in November. "That was my idea too… To have it open on the 19th of November. When I told her about it, she had a coy smile on her face…We had known each other for a while by then. Every year, on her birthday, I would take her a plant, she loved them." Sharat Das had been the architect of the Indira Gandhi Stadium. That experience, he says, left him exhausted. "I was very tired. I wasn't interested in working. I wanted to be idle." And in the midst of this idle life came his next commitment, appropriately, a leisure park. It was the perfect lucky break. A friend of his took him to dinner to meet two of his friends, Indians with a garment export business in Sweden. Looking to invest a few crores in real estate, they found themselves eating beside an architect who came highly recommended. "When they asked me for investment ideas, I suggested an amusement park." Where that idea came into his head at that very moment he knows. "I had always been fascinated with Disneyland… I'd never been there but I'd read everything there was to read about it. I was taken with the idea of it, so I put it to them." These friends were persuaded, and a few days later Sharat Das was in the ITFO offices to meet Chairman Yunus. Proposals were drafted and re-drafted, Das was traveling to Europe and the USA on reconnaissance excursions, a company was registered under the name International Amusement Limited, and Sharat Das signed on as chairman. The next step was to place the orders for the rides. "We never designed any of the original rides. An order was placed with a firm in Milano, and a 1-item order with a firm in Germany. 12 November was to be the delivery date." Then came the end of October - and "the fatal day" - as he calls it with as much History Channel drama as sober sadness. The assassination obviously killed the official festive spirit surrounding the anticipated opening; the riots were a bit of an obstruction to outdoor leisure, and perhaps a most pragmatic consideration. The Milano ferry with the park rides had docked in Bombay, but the nonplussed Italians found themselves in a port where all anchors were down. (A Boney M concert scheduled for the 3rd of November at Bradbourne Stadium stood postponed indefinitely [TOI 2 Nov 1984].) <#_ftn1> As nationwide transport systems lurched and halted, park officials were faced with the interesting possibility of not having a park to open at all. Unfazed, Sharat Das says he dispatched someone to Bombay to deal with the "paper-work" of clearances and licenses, telexed the Milano engineers to come in ahead of the machines, and arranged a meeting with Rajiv Gandhi: "He said to me, 'Das, I have not gone anywhere in these two weeks except between home and South Block. I do not think I can do this'… He wasn't sure it was the right thing to do." In a cruel twist, Indira Gandhi herself lent brand equity to the park: she had already given the gift of a name, now she was giving the gift of her birthday, a post-mortem sanctification and legitimization of revelry in the shadow of mourning. Such notions must have occurred to her son. He agreed to make his first public appearance since his mother's bloody execution at the opening of a children's park. "I remember reading about Disneyland…the day President Kennedy was shot dead, flags went down across the United States. Not in Disneyland." Mr Das explains that the official position was that the flag there was the Flag of Peace in the World of Children, such a flag of 'innocence' would always reign. The test had come to Appu Ghar, and all too soon. Would it, could it, should it open? As a dozen closed container trucks snaked their way from the Deccan to Delhicarrying mysterious shipments from Milano, engineers laid the foundations for rollercoasters and swaying ships. Appu Ghar would be the highlight of the 6th India International Trade Fair. A small story appears on the third page of The Statesman dated 14 November, from a staff reporter who was taken with others on a field trip to Appu Ghar: "On Tuesday, reporters were taken for a 'live' demonstration, but there was no electricity. However, Mr Yunus said that during the fair uninterrupted power supply would be ensured through a standby generator." From the night of the 14th, when the materials arrived, to the crack of dawn on the 19th, "we worked," Das says, "24 hours a day into 60 minutes. But we had it ready when it needed to be." ------------------------------ <#_ftnref1> I found it productive to record what Mr Das had to say rather than to interrogate his claims. A myth of origins, however dubious, retains the aura of permanence and elliptical authority. An analysis of the interview follows shortly. One could ask several questions: How much more of a hand did the NRI from Sweden have? And Mrs Gandhi? What is the place of Walt Disney in the imaginary of leisure spaces around the world? Why? Why has Mr Das not gone back to Appu Ghar, his labour of love, since he left the organization in 1988? -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: not available Type: application/defanged-78781 Size: 11233 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/urbanstudygroup/attachments/20070801/18dce537/attachment-0002.bin From jeebesh at sarai.net Wed Aug 1 22:24:12 2007 From: jeebesh at sarai.net (Jeebesh Bagchi) Date: Wed, 1 Aug 2007 22:24:12 +0530 Subject: [Urbanstudy] Fwd: Invitation for Press Conference on August 3, 2007, 4 PM, Press Club References: <34de8130708010947u5b74850ck4e946a690bcad3ea@mail.gmail.com> Message-ID: Someone check this out!! Begin forwarded message: > From: "pnn hindi" > Date: 1 August 2007 10:17:57 PM GMT+05:30 > Subject: Invitation for Press Conference on August 3, 2007, 4 PM, > Press Club > > Dear , > > The Campaign for Judicial Accountability and Reforms is holding a > Press Conference on August 3, 2007 at the Press Club of India, > Raisina Road, New Delhi at 4 PM to highlight a grave case of > Judicial Misconduct at the Apex of the Indian Judiciary. At the > press conference we will disclose how the then Chief Justice of > India who had spearheaded the sealing drive was mired in serious > conflict of interest in as much as his sons were deeply involved in > the business of shopping malls and commercial complexes who stood > to benefit from this sealing drive. Very important revelations will > be made and documents released about this case. Where The Press > Conference will be addressed by Shri Shanti Bhushan, former Union > Law Minister, Mr. Bhaskar Rao, Chairman, Centre for Media Studies, > Ms. Kamini Jaiswal, advocate, Supreme Court and Mr. Prashant > Bhushan among others. Kindly send a reporter to cover the Press > Conference. > > > > Thanking you, > > (PRASHANT BHUSHAN) > > > > PS: incase you are unable to attend please send a colleague to > cover the conference > > > > Please feel free to call: Devvrat (981181730) or Leena (9811137421) > > > -- > Campaign for Judicial Accountability and Judicial Reforms > 14, Tower 2, Supreme Enclave, Mayur Vihar Phase- INew Delhi- 110 091 > Tel: 9811137421, 9811818730; > E-mail:judicialreforms at gmail.com -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: Hindi Invitation.pdf Type: application/pdf Size: 11576 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/urbanstudygroup/attachments/20070801/4874abb2/attachment-0002.pdf -------------- next part -------------- From sanjeev.rgtu at gmail.com Fri Aug 3 01:00:10 2007 From: sanjeev.rgtu at gmail.com (Sanjeev Sharma) Date: Fri, 3 Aug 2007 01:00:10 +0530 Subject: [Urbanstudy] Second Call for Paper - Bharatiya Vigyan Sammelan, BVS 2007, Bhopal MP Message-ID: <311151090708021230l71d71f2fw6ead24fda048c70a@mail.gmail.com> Bharatiya Vigyan Sammelan, 23-25 November, 2007 http://www.bvsindia.org The focal theme of the conference is - *Integral Scientific Management of Natural Resources For Sustainable Development with special focus on Best Traditional and Current Practices in Agri-Forestry and Rural Technology in India and Abroad. * In addition to individual delegates and representatives from institutions, the conference will also have associate delegates comprising of Post-graduates and Research Scholars as observers, selected from R&D institutions, Colleges and Universities. We invite all Scientists, Technocrats, Academicians, Policy Makers, Research Scholars, Students and common people who have an affinity towards Science and Technology to participate and contribute to this conference. Science and Technology, forms the thrust engine of development for any society. An overwhelmingly large number of over 6 lac villages still await infrastructure facilities and basic amenities. There is a growing disparity between the haves and the have-nots. It is becoming increasingly imperative that inclusive growth becomes a reality and not just a slogan. We have a gigantic task at hand. Effective intervention through appropriate technologies can play an important role in providing urban amenities in rural areas. These interventions will be able to control the ever-growing problems of urbanization, rural poverty, environmental degradation and unequal growth. Language plays a very significant role in the 'lab to land' concept. In our country, with 23 recognized official national languages including Hindi and English, language plays a key role in science and technology dissemination among the masses.India, a nation of a billion people, cradle of the oldest civilization of mankind, is marching ahead with indomitable power and incorrigible confidence. Home to the 2nd largest population of the world, we have to fulfill a billion dreams as well as our global responsibilities The conference shall comprise of invited talks from eminent personalities in the area of interest and contributed papers for oral/poster presentations. Scientists, Technologists, Research Scholars, Policy makers and Stake Holders in S & T are invited to send two page Extended Abstracts (in Hindi or English or both) of their papers before 15th August, 2007. The Abstracts should be accompanied with Registration form for attending the conference. The Abstracts and full paper may be sent as MS-Word files to :\ bvs at rgtu.net The Abstracts can also be sent as hard copies to * Executive Chairman, Bhartiya Vigyan Sammelan, Samanvay Karyalaya, B-44, 45 Banglow, Professors Colony, Opp Mulla Ramuzi Bhawan, Bhopal, MP* * Conference Theme:* 1. Agriculture, Horticulture, Animal Husbandry and Veterinary Sciences 2. Forestry and Environmental Sciences 3. Water Management 4. Energy Management 5. Mineral Resources and Materials Science/Technology 6. Meteorology and Climate 7. Health and Medical Sciences including AYUSH and Nutraceuticals 8. Housing, Habitat and Architecture 9. Basic Sciences : Mathematics, Physics, Chemistry, Geology, Astronomy, Life Sciences. 10. Cutting Edge Technologies (BIO, IT, NANO - Status and Possibilities) 11. Science Communication through Regional Languages 12. Engineering and Technological Sciences 13 Marine and Aquaculture Sciences Last date for : Abstract Submission :30th August, 2007 Notification for Acceptance : 30th September, 2007 Submission of Full Text of paper :15th October, 2007 Registration:15th October, 2007 *The Registration fee,* for the conference, which shall include the conference material and working lunch during the conference period, is as follows : Institutional Delegates : Rs. 5,000/- (upto 3 delegates) Individual Delegates : Rs. 1,000/- Research Scholars and Members of Organizing Institutions: Rs. 500/- Student Observers and Persons accompanying delegates : Rs. 500/- email : bvs at rgtu.net url: http://www.bvsindia.org Conference Dates : November 23-25, 2007 Venue: Ravindra Bhawan, Bhopal Our mailing address is: Samanvay Karyalaya, B-44, 45 Banglow Opposite Mulla Ramuzi Bhawan, Professors Colony, Bhopal, MP Our Contect: bvs at rgtu.net -- Sanjeev Sharma Faculty. School of Information Technology Rajiv Gandhi Technological University, Air Port By Pass Road, Bhopal (M.P.) India 462 036 PH: +917552678825 Fax : +917552678834 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/urbanstudygroup/attachments/20070803/0c7cd453/attachment-0002.html From renu_d at berkeley.edu Fri Aug 3 23:35:41 2007 From: renu_d at berkeley.edu (renu_d at berkeley.edu) Date: Fri, 3 Aug 2007 11:05:41 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Urbanstudy] Call for Papers: Interrogating Urbanism in Contemporary South Asia Message-ID: <1770.75.20.207.220.1186164341.squirrel@calmail.berkeley.edu> Hi everyone, I am a PhD candidate at the Dept of Architecture at the University of California, Berkeley. Along with another colleague I am organizing a one-day symposium titled "Cities and Citizenship: Interrogating Urbanism in Contemporary South Asia" in February 2008. Attached below is the Call for Papers. My own research is on the politics of urban redevelopment in Ahmedabad and although I haven't made any postings here before, for more than a year now I have been tuned into some of the discussions on this group. So I hope that we will receive some paper abstracts from some of the folks whose postings I've read. Although unfortunately we don't have a large budget and will not be able to offer any travel assistance. Regards, Renu ----------------------- Symposium on CITIES AND CITIZENSHIP: INTERROGATING URBANISM IN CONTEMPORARY SOUTH ASIA February 14, 2008 University of California, Berkeley (exact location to be announced) Sponsored by the Center for South Asia Studies, University of California, Berkeley CALL FOR PAPERS The history of cities has long favored the West as the center of urbanization, thus casting the cities of the Global South in the rhetoric of delayed development and borrowed modernities. Indeed, the postcolonial condition of South Asian cities has been continually rendered as the shadow of former colonial cities struggling to cope with inefficiencies of the postcolonial state in managing urbanization and more recently with pressures of globalization and transnational forces. In order to move beyond a dialogue which frames the cities of the developing world as derivative of a Euro-Ameri-centric core we propose an interrogation of South Asian cities through the theoretical lens of citizenship. The evolving definition of citizenship—originally a product of the urban enclave (as in the medieval bastide or the polis) to a right defined by a larger national political community—is being recalibrated once again as cities around the world become the salient units of economic and political change. The notion of republican citizenship, as premised on an idea of universal liberalism, has most strenuously been challenged in the urban sphere, be it through the ghettoization of minorities or the growing enclaves of the wealthy. At the same time, diverse initiatives and grassroots mobilizations have emerged to counter old and new urban inequalities and spatial exclusions. Although the re-scripting of urban space in cities across the world is thus producing new notions of citizenship, both restrictive and expansive, the modalities through which these are produced remain contingent upon historical and geographical specificities. South Asian cities have recently come center-stage through innovative explorations in fiction, photography, and documentary film. This one-day symposium will provide a forum for cross-disciplinary dialogue which brings these perspectives from the humanities in conversation with those in the social sciences in order to investigate the urban realm. We encourage submissions that deal with cities in Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal, and Sri Lanka as a means to expand the discussion of South Asian urbanism beyond the case-study of India. We invite papers that speak to the issues outlined in the following three themes: I. Propertied Citizenship and Landscapes of Consumption Following market liberalization, South Asian cities have witnessed a rapid integration into global consumer markets and commodity networks, fostering new and more aggressive consumption practices. With the re-ordering of urban space in a global economic context in which cities compete for capital, jobs, and tourists, property has also become an increasingly significant register through which elite groups pressure the state to “clean up” cities in order to privilege their own needs and sensibilities. These shifts are reflected in new urban phenomena such as the mushrooming of shopping malls and gated communities and the proliferation of technology parks. We invite papers which focus on the city as a nexus of global networks, local vectors of management and reform, and consumption practices. II. Recalibrating Urban Governmentality Following neo-liberal reforms in recent decades, South Asian cities have played a crucial role in the rescaling of the state and the decentralization of government apparatuses. For example, the pressures of globalization on labor coupled with efforts to ensure a city’s position in the new global economy has led to the creation of extra-governmental spaces of production, such as Special Economic Zones. The rise of civil-society movements and non-governmental organizations has also led to a significant recalibration of urban governmentality. Notwithstanding these new modalities of governmentality which involve a constellation of non-state actors, the right to land and resources made by an individual or community continues to engage the state and political actors at various scales, often mobilizing informal practices such as squatting and land-grabbing which involve highly politicized negotiations. We invite papers that examine the role of the state in the contemporary urban realm and that speak to various agents and processes that challenge the managerial sovereignty of the state therein. III. Re-scripting Identity through Urban Space The diversity within South Asian societies, the historical legacies of colonialism, and most recently the processes of globalization have continually brought forth challenges to the modern nation-state and democracy in the region. Many of these challenges are articulated and played out in the urban arena, through an assemblage of spatial practices. For example, the occupation of the city through religious processions, the construction of violent spatial imaginaries that pit religious groups against each other, and the redefinition of the urban subject through hegemonic constructions of masculinity or femininity, appropriate the city as a site of contestation over the nation and the state. We invite papers that focus on the re-scripting of ethnic, racial, class, and gendered identities in/through urban space and which explore this through different media such as art, film, literature, performance and so forth. Paper abstracts will be accepted by e-mail at southasiancities at gmail.com through September 15, 2007. Abstracts should be 400-500 words in length and authors should attach the abstract as a Word document as well as include the text of the abstract in the body of the message. Please be sure to include the following information in the e-mail as well: Full name, departmental affiliation, degree program, and the title of your abstract. Accepted authors will receive e-mail notification no later than October 15, 2007. Accepted authors will be expected to submit a draft working paper by January 10, 2008. For additional information, please contact the symposium coordinators: Romola Sanyal (romi_s at berkeley.edu) or Renu Desai (renu_d at berkeley.edu). From pnnhindi at gmail.com Sat Aug 4 21:04:09 2007 From: pnnhindi at gmail.com (pnn hindi) Date: Sat, 4 Aug 2007 21:04:09 +0530 Subject: [Urbanstudy] NEWS- WITHER JUDICIAL ACCOUNTABILITY? THE CASE OF JUSTICE SABHARWAL Message-ID: Click Here To See The Documents, Concerning The Facts WITHER JUDICIAL ACCOUNTABILITY? THE CASE OF JUSTICE SABHARWAL: DISQUIETING FACTS, DISTURBING IMPLICATIONS Minakshi PNN: 3, Aug. The issue of accountability of the higher judiciary has long been troubling all sections of society so at a press conference held in Press Club of India the former Law minister Shanti Bhushan and sr. advocate Supreme court Prashant Bhushan among others highlighted a grave case of judicial misconduct at the Apex of Indian Judiciary on behalf of campaign for Judicial Accountability and Reforms. Prashant Bhushan exposed that on 16'" February 2006, the then Chief Justice of India, Y.K. Sabharwal passed a detailed order setting into motion the process of sealing of properties in designated residential areas of Delhi, being used for commercial purposes, forcing to buy or rent premises in shopping malls and commercial complexes.. The Court's orders were ostensibly made to implement the rule of law as embodied by the Delhi Master Plan 2001, which had designated the land use of those areas as residential. Despite the new master 2021 the court ordered the sealing to continue, despite the fact that the new master plan permitted the owners to use their premises for commercial purposes. He further added the prices of shops and offices in the shopping malls and commercial complexes doubled and tripled almost overnight making many people question whether the sealing drive was being undertaken for the benefit of the Mall and Commercial complex developers. De facto these orders were being made by Justice Sabharwal, his two sons, Chetan and Nitin who until then had small export import businesses, had entered into partnerships with big Mall and Commercial complex developers Kabul Chawla of the BPTP group and , Purshottam Bagheria and had become big Commercial complex developers themselves. Till 2004, the Sabharwals owned 3 companies ostensibly doing small time export import business, Pawan Impex, Sabs exports and Sug exports. their officially settled at the Sabharwals' family home at 3/81 Punjabi Bagh. In January 2004 they were shifted to Justice Sabharwal's official residence at 6 Moti Lal Nehru Marg and on 7 May 2004, Justice Sabharwal had ordered the sealing of properties where industries had been running in residential areas? but his official residence could hardly be sealed. Just after the order of sealing his sons were well on their way to entering the business of Malls and commercial complexes in a big way, having sewn up partnerships with two of the biggest Commercial estate developers in Delhi business of the Sabharwals really took off thereafter. On 22/8/06, Pawan Impex was given a loan of 28 Crores by the Union Bank of lndia, Connaught Place on the security of imaginary plant, machinery and other assets" lying at plot Nos A 3, 4, &, 5 in Sector 125, Noida, nothing in actual, only a huge 1.T. park (5 lac Sq Ft, worth hundreds of crores. Interestingly, these 3 huge plots of 12,000 Sq. Metres in a prime sector of Noida were allotted to Pawan Impex on 29 Dec 2004 by the Mulayam Singh/Amar Singh government of U.P. at a rate of only Rs. 3,700/sq Metre, another huge commercial plot of 12,000 sq metres (plot 12A, in Sector 68, which appears to have been carved out later as an afterthought) on 10 November 2006, at a price of 4000 Rs/sq metre, 3 plots (C1033, lO4 and 105) of 800 Sq M each in Sector 63 at a rate of Rs. 2, I 00 each, other in Sector 8 Noida, the CBI investigation into the allotments ordered by the Allahabad High Court was immediately stayed by Justice B.P. Singh of the Supreme Court moreover the publication of the infamous Amar Singh tapes, was stayed by Justice Sabharwal himself on the matter being merely mentioned before him. Thus, the Sabharwals in just two years time, got into the business of developing Commercial complexes and appear to be rolling in money during the time when Justice Sabharwal was a senior judge and then Chief Justice, dealing with the sealing cases and passing orders. Former law minister Shanti Bhushan also said that the conduct of Justice Sabharwal and his sons appear to involve offences and misdemeanors beyond the Income Tax Act. His orders are against the principles of natural justice, which say that no judge can hear a case in which he is personally interested. It is in fact arguable that his dealing with this case in such circumstances involves an offence under the Prevention of Corruption Act. He and other senior Judges and advocates demanded the need to be thoroughly probed, particularly to see how and to what extent they funded the activities and acquistion of assets of the Sabharwals. whether their acquisition can be legitimately explained. A call was made to the society to pressurize the Parliament and the government to bring a suitable Constitutional Amendment Bill for this purpose. 011 22756796, 9211530510 PNN , Delhi-91 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/urbanstudygroup/attachments/20070804/bda98e33/attachment-0002.html From esg at bgl.vsnl.net.in Mon Aug 6 14:33:51 2007 From: esg at bgl.vsnl.net.in (ESG VSNL) Date: Mon, 06 Aug 2007 14:33:51 +0530 Subject: [Urbanstudy] [Fwd: [pnnhindi] News on WITHER JUDICIAL ACCOUNTABILITY? THE CASE OF JUSTICESABHARWAL] Message-ID: <46B6E3F7.5000006@bgl.vsnl.net.in> http://judicialaccontbility.blogspot.com/ WITHER JUDICIAL ACCOUNTABILITY? THE CASE OF JUSTICE SABHARWAL: DISQUIETING FACTS, DISTURBING IMPLICATIONS Minakshi PNN: 3, Aug. The issue of accountability of the higher judiciary has long been troubling all sections of society so at a press conference held in Press Club of India the former Law minister Shanti Bhushan and sr. advocate Supreme court Prashant Bhushan among others highlighted a grave case of judicial misconduct at the Apex of Indian Judiciary on behalf of campaign for Judicial Accountability and Reforms. Prashant Bhushan exposed that on 16'" February 2006, the then Chief Justice of India, Y.K. Sabharwal passed a detailed order setting into motion the process of sealing of properties in designated residential areas of Delhi, being used for commercial purposes, forcing to buy or rent premises in shopping malls and commercial complexes.. The Court's orders were ostensibly made to implement the rule of law as embodied by the Delhi Master Plan 2001, which had designated the land use of those areas as residential. Despite the new master 2021 the court ordered the sealing to continue, despite the fact that the new master plan permitted the owners to use their premises for commercial purposes. He further added the prices of shops and offices in the shopping malls and commercial complexes doubled and tripled almost overnight making many people question whether the sealing drive was being undertaken for the benefit of the Mall and Commercial complex developers. De facto these orders were being made by Justice Sabharwal, his two sons, Chetan and Nitin who until then had small export import businesses, had entered into partnerships with big Mall and Commercial complex developers Kabul Chawla of the BPTP group and , Purshottam Bagheria and had become big Commercial complex developers themselves. Till 2004, the Sabharwals owned 3 companies ostensibly doing small time export import business, Pawan Impex, Sabs exports and Sug exports. their officially settled at the Sabharwals' family home at 3/81 Punjabi Bagh. In January 2004 they were shifted to Justice Sabharwal's official residence at 6 Moti Lal Nehru Marg and on 7 May 2004, Justice Sabharwal had ordered the sealing of properties where industries had been running in residential areas? but his official residence could hardly be sealed. Just after the order of sealing his sons were well on their way to entering the business of Malls and commercial complexes in a big way, having sewn up partnerships with two of the biggest Commercial estate developers in Delhi business of the Sabharwals really took off thereafter. On 22/8/06, Pawan Impex was given a loan of 28 Crores by the Union Bank of lndia, Connaught Place on the security of imaginary plant, machinery and other assets" lying at plot Nos A 3, 4, &, 5 in Sector 125, Noida, nothing in actual, only a huge 1.T. park (5 lac Sq Ft, worth hundreds of crores. Interestingly, these 3 huge plots of 12,000 Sq. Metres in a prime sector of Noida were allotted to Pawan Impex on 29 Dec 2004 by the Mulayam Singh/Amar Singh government of U.P. at a rate of only Rs. 3,700/sq Metre, another huge commercial plot of 12,000 sq metres (plot 12A, in Sector 68, which appears to have been carved out later as an afterthought) on 10 November 2006, at a price of 4000 Rs/sq metre, 3 plots (C1033, lO4 and 105) of 800 Sq M each in Sector 63 at a rate of Rs. 2, I 00 each, other in Sector 8 Noida, the CBI investigation into the allotments ordered by the Allahabad High Court was immediately stayed by Justice B.P. Singh of the Supreme Court moreover the publication of the infamous Amar Singh tapes, was stayed by Justice Sabharwal himself on the matter being merely mentioned before him. Thus, the Sabharwals in just two years time, got into the business of developing Commercial complexes and appear to be rolling in money during the time when Justice Sabharwal was a senior judge and then Chief Justice, dealing with the sealing cases and passing orders. Former law minister Shanti Bhushan also said that the conduct of Justice Sabharwal and his sons appear to involve offences and misdemeanors beyond the Income Tax Act. His orders are against the principles of natural justice, which say that no judge can hear a case in which he is personally interested. It is in fact arguable that his dealing with this case in such circumstances involves an offence under the Prevention of Corruption Act. He and other senior Judges and advocates demanded the need to be thoroughly probed, particularly to see how and to what extent they funded the activities and acquistion of assets of the Sabharwals. whether their acquisition can be legitimately explained. A call was made to the society to pressurize the Parliament and the government to bring a suitable Constitutional Amendment Bill for this purpose. 011 22756796, 9211530510 PNN , Delhi-91 ************************************************************** Scanned by eScan Anti-Virus and Content Security Software. Visit http://www.mwti.net for more info on eScan and MailScan. ************************************************************** From bijulaal at gmail.com Wed Aug 8 14:30:46 2007 From: bijulaal at gmail.com (Bijulal M.V.) Date: Wed, 8 Aug 2007 14:30:46 +0530 Subject: [Urbanstudy] : Plachimada Dtruggle enters a new phase: Solidarity Convention ISI, 10 August, 10 Am Message-ID: Dear friends All of you are aware of the Anti Coke struggle in Plachimada. Plachimada. Anti cola struggle front is a social collective opposing corporate exploitation as well as asserting constitutional and legal rights of the people, having representation from all political parties in the support structure of the movement. The struggle is entering to the fifth year. Changing the nature with an indefinite hunger strike from 15 August 2007 in front of the Factory. The Plachimada Solidarity Committee and the Delhi solidarity group (DSG) is joining together to emphasize the need of strengthening the struggle as well as seeking support from national and international audience, for the immediate closure of the company and compensation for corporate crimes in Plachimada. We are holding a meeting at Indian Social Institute Lodi Road, on 10 August 10 am to 2pm regarding this The main intentions of the meeting to inform more on the issue and the movement to share the experiences with similar movements and issues so that to get a wider on to corporate exploitation and failure of democratic institutions and policies Please do attend the meeting and CIRCULATE Bijulal MV 99 68 16 10 12 -- BIJULAL HUMAN RIGHTS & LAW UNIT INDIAN SOCIAL INSTITUTE LODI ROAD, NEW DELHI 110003 24622379 (O) 99 68 16 10 12 (MOB) From sebydesiolim at hotmail.com Mon Aug 13 20:34:20 2007 From: sebydesiolim at hotmail.com (sebastian Rodrigues) Date: Mon, 13 Aug 2007 20:34:20 +0530 Subject: [Urbanstudy] Women fighters from Bambolim battlefield Message-ID: August 13 2007 There are many of them but I got to meet only two of them. The first one is grand mother Kalyani Andrade who is engaged in defence of her land against take over by real estate lobby. Here is her picture link: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-browse_image.php?imageId=124 The second one is Teja Hadkondkar. She is an elected member of Bambolim-Talaulim-Curca-Nauxi Panchayat, Goa, India. Here she is actively battling the invaders: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-browse_image.php?imageId=126 These fighters deserves all the support and encouragement. Indeed they are role models for battle on land rights in Goa. And of course they are doing it in the interest on younger generation and generations yet to be born. Here is a child in the middle of the Battle as the builders want to raze down their house. They attempted it once. We all owe answer to this child: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-browse_image.php?imageId=136 This boy's family leaves in a beautiful house at Bambolim coast. They are are targeted and regularly harassed by the goons in uniforms and out of uniforms. Here is the picture of house that builders are preying upon: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-browse_image.php?imageId=129 While I went to support the people there, Aldeia de Goa's security personnel charged at me. They were demanding that I stop filming the injustice to people, rape of nature and transformation of Goa State as rubber stamp of builders and miners. Here is their security chief trying to stop me from filming: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-browse_image.php?imageId=125 And more security personnel was brought in to stop my camera, they could not: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-browse_image.php?imageId=131 New roads being constructed to the Bambolim beach. People's voices are sought to be throttled when they protested against this. Of course 146 acres of land for filthy rich needs new roads. If needed roads can be build over the people's houses, their bed rooms and even their dead bodies in near future: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-browse_image.php?imageId=130 Insult to the planet goes unabated: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-browse_image.php?imageId=139 And there are underground constructions possibly the swimming pools. Of course for those who are to buy their bungalows here at Aldea de Goa at the cost ranging between 0ne to five crore deserve the luxuries of life. Never mind this is going to cause complete disruptions to the lives of people in Bambolim and Nauxi villages : both tribal villages they are going to be erased. In any case Aldea de Goa believes that they have come to be elites with elites of Goa at Dona Paula. http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-browse_image.php?imageId=138 And they declare they have all the legal permissions for their rule of 'might is right': http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-browse_image.php?imageId=141 And just to remind you again as to who they are: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-browse_image.php?imageId=122 They have plenty of money; for their business is eco-crimes and community rights violations, they pay to chop, over 5000 coconut trees in the past few months. That landlord Sinari and others have no feelings for all this they got their bucks pockets full, secure for all their future generations. Their trickery in getting the land in their possession during Portuguese colonial times and later on in 'free' Goa paid of at last. http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-browse_image.php?imageId=133 The meaning of 'Aldeia' in Portuguese means 'village'. What sought of village is this that is being build upon livilihoods of People of Goa? Village whose conception is in rape of nature? Is it a village at all? You be the judge... Warmly, Seby Visit my blog at http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-view_blog.php?blogId=17 _________________________________________________________________ Best Shaadi proposals by email. Register now. http://ss1.richmedia.in/recurl.asp?pid=106 From mansilight at gmail.com Tue Aug 14 16:31:38 2007 From: mansilight at gmail.com (Meera (Mansi) Baindur) Date: Tue, 14 Aug 2007 16:31:38 +0530 Subject: [Urbanstudy] Lake Blog Message-ID: <998c34570708140401q12984edeg62bb6e7e50707202@mail.gmail.com> We created a blog of the third posting with pictures. Please take a look at it. Meera http://lakeprojecthebbalsarai.blogspot.com/ -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/urbanstudygroup/attachments/20070814/788d799b/attachment-0002.html From cugambetta at yahoo.com Tue Aug 14 17:10:26 2007 From: cugambetta at yahoo.com (Curt Gambetta) Date: Tue, 14 Aug 2007 04:40:26 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Urbanstudy] Fw: interview with Christpher Benninger on Indian cities Message-ID: <343888.39978.qm@web56810.mail.re3.yahoo.com> Benninger's perspective is interesting... his observations and early planning work seem to head in one direction, while in the other direction he is beholden to master planning. I like the spirit of his early work, it would be interesting to see documentation of the projects (thanks for the heads up Leo) From: ESG India To: ECwatch ; urbanstudygroup at sarai.net; hasiruusiru at yahoogroups.com; Curt Gambetta ; Subbarayan Prasanna ; Bhargavi Rao ; Robert John Chandran Sent: Monday, August 13, 2007 12:47:36 PM Subject: [Fwd: `India simply has no urban plans`] http://www.business-standard.com/common/storypage_c.php?leftnm=10&autono=294076 `India simply has no urban plans` Gargi Gupta / New Delhi August 11, 2007 Award-winning architect Christopher C Benninger speaks to Gargi Gupta in a rare interview about his reason for staying on to work in India and his architectural interventions across Asia. Christopher Charles Benninger is a revered name among architects in India. An alumnus of Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s department of urban planning and Harvard University’s architecture school, where he later taught, Benninger came to India in 1968 on a Fulbright Fellowship and later as a Ford Foundation consultant. And stayed back. He set up the School of Urban Planning in Ahmedabad in 1971, together with Balkrishna V Doshi, and the Centre for Development Studies and Activities in Pune. Benninger, who set up an architectural studio in Pune in 1996, has designed a number of acclaimed structures, most notably the Mahindra United World College, which won an award from the American Institute of Architects, and made it to the final lists for the Aga Khan Award for Architecture Geneva, and The World Architecture Awards, Berlin. But more interestingly, Benninger is an authority on urban planning; he is a member of the governing council of the World Society of Ekistics, Athens and has advised the governments of India, Sri Lanka Bhutan, Malaysia, Indonesia and other countries, as also multilateral agencies like the Ford Foundation, World Bank, Asian Development Bank, UN-FAO, UN-ESCAP, UNICEF, UNCHS on urban planning and regional development plans. India is going through a real estate boom with buildings of every kind coming up all over the place. But architecturally, are they breaking any new ground? Architecture mirrors the society for which it is created. It is no better or no worse. The new economy in India is based on its becoming a world destination for out-sourcing, where cost-cutting is the client’s objective. But they want to do this with a global touch. Ninety percent of the projects are “cold shells”, where low budgets and fast track schedules are the design brief. Quality and beauty, and creating better places to live in, are not what people are doing because it is not the agenda in the first place. You were one of the first architects to work with HUDCO and other local urban development authorities, on housing for economically weaker sections. Can you describe the work you did? In the 1970s, I had the opportunity to design the first affordable housing scheme for economically weaker sections. Located in Jamnagar, it was a system of houses where each one had a WC, a tap, a room and a courtyard with a stair to the roof. In 1973, I introduced the concept of Site and Services (which I had developed as a student in Harvard, as my thesis). The idea was that poor families could build their own climatic protection, but they lacked the land tenure to allow upgradation, as also rudimentary services like storm water drains, street lights, potable water taps, sewerage connect and access lanes. My idea was that we provide what they cannot provide and they provide what they can! I was doing this under World Bank funding for the urban development authority at Chennai. This proved very successful as we could provide about 15,000 service plots at the same cost it would have taken to build 1,800 small houses! This idea was replicated by the World Bank globally. This is a case where India exported intellectual property to the world at no cost! The Bank just picked it up and ran! I worked with Dattatrey and Laxmanan (urban planners at the Madras Urban Development Authority) and we did it only for the thrill of solving problems. Later, we found a number of Washington-based “experts” claiming our invention as their own. In 1976, I prepared the first project for the Hyderabad Urban Development Authority in its first year of existence. I wanted to explore the concept that the secure urban poor could be the developers for the economically weaker section for whom rental shelter made more sense. So we laid out a township of 2,000 houses, amenities, shopping and open areas where the owners had a small core house with essential services on 100 sq m plots. What happened was that the owners quickly built more rooms and rented them out to still lower income groups (often relatives or village mates) at an affordable rent where the tenants used the sanitary infrastructure (increasing its efficiency by multiples) and the landlords harvested rents for loan payments and upgradation. These were three different and unique channels which gave access to the poor for housing. This is what I call “social architecture”. I also carried out large scale planning operations for the Mumbai Metropolitan Development Authority (mid-1980s) in Thane and in Kalyan. Generally, development plans only calculate the per capita needs for water, electricity and sewerage disposal and provide these at the trunk infrastructure level. This leaves out 70 per cent of the population who live in slums, sub-divided chawls and old structures. We turned this around and went directly to the users and worked out participatory strategies for common potable water taps, bathing places and WCs. At the other end of the scale, we looked at regional water resources, storm drainage networks and transport systems. By integrating these from both ends, a viable urban strategy was designed. In Thane, much of this was implemented in the early 1990’s, which turned around the city’s economy! This concept of slum up-gradation became a fourth channel providing access for the poor to shelter. Why are you still not doing this kind of work? First, I am interested in designing concepts and inventing ideas and not in becoming a factory producing housing! Second, I realised that one could have more impact on access to shelter than through construction. Our urban planning legislation was modelled on the British Garden Cities movement and these used wide boulevards, huge parks, immense house plots, single-function land use zoning and low density as yardsticks. I knew that neither the government, nor the urban poor, had the resources to follow this model. The answers to our problems rested in new laws, new town-planning standards, new philosophies and new principles. That is why I put down the Principles of Intelligent Urbanism, which became the basis for much of my recent planning work. What ails urban planning in India? …is that we do not have urban plans! We just have two dimensional plans marked with colors for land use restrictions and density restrictions. We link up building control regulations for different zones and call that a plan. These are merely restrictions on land development and not catalysts and enablers. A plan guides and facilitates development. Not only that, for cities like Pune the last development plan was prepared way back in the mid-1980s! This is criminal. Fast track cities like Hong Kong and Singapore have used extensive urban planning to assure economic development. In Singapore, all the land belongs to the government and is leased to the private sector for development within very clear urban design guidelines. Sixty percent of the people live in public, government-owned houses. In India we had the worst of capitalism and the worst of socialism! We are confused that the two are mutually exclusive! What we are doing in SEZs and business parks is just the beginning of a more viable system. But we do not have a viable system. There are rare exceptions to this like what is happening in Ahmedabad, where there is a strong private-public partnership and town planning schemes to provide a rational pattern for urban growth. Cities in India were totally neglected during the first 50 years of independence. There was no understanding that rural regions and cities are all one integrated system. We are now paying through congestion, pollution and unsanitary living standards. Good regional and urban planning is good business. No one understood this. In a way Indian cities disprove economic theory. It was always thought that economic growth follows the emplacement of economic and social infrastructure. Cities like Pune and Bangalore are growing despite serious infrastructure gaps! The events in West Bengal are not due to “pig headedness”! We have to learn from that experience and put people first! Good planning is participatory planning! Part of our problem today is that the graduates of business schools who have very narrow educations, they are arrogant regarding their limited knowledge and in their poor skills for consultative decision making. Why did it take you so long to set up your own studio? I never wanted to live off of the proceeds of an architectural studio. After all architecture is an art, not a business! All of my early works are for NGOs, voluntary workers, or for myself and institutions I was deeply involved in. Harish Mahindra drew me into running a larger studio by asking me to design the United World College of India, which won the American Institute of Architects Award 2000 and which fuelled our client list. Architects do need patrons to create. We need media coverage to meet patrons! Unless we are careful, it can become a vicious cycle of greed and money making. I have never chased after a client. I am arrogant with clients as far as they must know I am my own man, just like their heart surgeon will not just follow their orders! On the other hand, I am the servant of my clients and I have to keep their interests above all else! But I do not design for developers who will cut specs and pass on their sins to unknown end-users! It took me so long to set up my studio because I think it takes 40 or 50 years to learn the craft of architecture. I think I am still a student. My teachers are history, my craftsmen and my team members in the studio! Every new building is a new invention and we can carry into that process learning from the design before it and our earlier projects, but it is new and we have to be humble about it! Our clients are often represented by young managers who know nothing of the building process! They think one can create beauty in a month or a few weeks! This is an illness spreading like AIDS and we as professionals must educate the public about the disease! It is impacting the character of the urban fabric which nurtures us and which underpins the very creation of wealth we sustain ourselves upon. What has kept you in India for so long? I have always felt I am an Indian through and through! From the day I set foot in India, in 1968, I never felt strange or in an exotic place. I love India’s people, the landscape, the seasons, the dust, the heat, the dynamics, the food and even the chaos of the cities and the peace of the villages. When I feel out of place is when I step foot off a plane in America! Immediately I think, “When can I get out of here?” India has its own indigenous architecture, with concepts and designs more suited to local conditions. Do you incorporate elements of this in your designs? Architecture, good or bad, emerges from its context! One cannot incorporate elements really. Maybe one can decorate a building and make it look indigenous, which is a sham! One has to let designs emerge from the landscape, crafts people, materials and the client’s needs! All of these variables are Indian and thus my architecture is Indian! Even if I experiment in glass and in steel, it is my Indian curiosity about things new and things different. It is my Indian interest to bring outside things in and integrate everything into one huge pantheon of ideas and concepts. Territorial concerns Tell us about your consultancy work for South-east Asian countries? I have been involved in the preparation and analysis of plans for existing and new towns in Malaysia (Terengganu), Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Nepal and Bhutan at different levels. In Malaysia, I was pushing policy changes as the government was building new towns for the poor with such large plots and such high technical standards that these could never be handed over to the stake-holders for self management and local governance! Only if a patronising authority managed these towns could they survive with large subsidies. In Indonesia, I designed the shelter strategy for the rural poor as one of the corner stones of the first National Rural Development Programme. In Nepal, I designed an institutional system for local participation, micro-level panning and decentralised implementation. What is this project you are at present involved in in Bhutan? In Bhutan, I have prepared the physical plans and economic strategies for three new industrial areas that will piggy-back on the surplus power and new labour force emerging. We also prepared the new capital plan, designs for the capitol complex and key buildings in the complex. These are under construction. Perhaps of more interest are the 15 local area plans within the over-all structure plans in four cities in Bhutan. These plans are for compact urbanDEFANGED.3345> ----- Forwarded Message ----villages with all basic services and amenities. These are prepared with the involvement of local land owners in which they bank all their land, and after leaving aside 30 per cent for common facilities, are given back well laid out plots equal to 70 per cent of what they handed over. The trick? The new rectilinear plots with road access and basic services are worth five times what their original odd-shaped agricultural land was worth. ************************************************************** Scanned by eScan Anti-Virus and Content Security Software. Visit http://www.mwti.net for more info on eScan and MailScan. ************************************************************** ____________________________________________________________________________________ Need a vacation? Get great deals to amazing places on Yahoo! Travel. http://travel.yahoo.com/ From esg at bgl.vsnl.net.in Wed Aug 15 15:28:19 2007 From: esg at bgl.vsnl.net.in (ESG India (VSNL)) Date: Wed, 15 Aug 2007 15:28:19 +0530 Subject: [Urbanstudy] Parliament of India Q&A Bulletin XI.1 Message-ID: <46C2CE3B.7060602@bgl.vsnl.net.in> Dear All, Please find enclosed a compilation of questions being raised in the XI session of Parliament of India. The purpose of this bulletin is to help researchers and campaignists to closely follow developments in the Parliament on matters pertaining to economic, social and environmental justice issues in India. Our next bulletin will be disseminated when the Parliament website is updated. Any comments, queries and suggestions may kindly be send to Nandini (nandini at esgindia.org) who compiled this Bulletin. Best wishes Leo Saldanha Environment Support Group ************************************************************** Scanned by eScan Anti-Virus and Content Security Software. Visit http://www.mwti.net for more info on eScan and MailScan. ************************************************************** -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: POI_Q_A_BulletinXI.1_130807.rtf Type: application/msword Size: 116406 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/urbanstudygroup/attachments/20070815/d5f73401/attachment-0002.dot From esg at bgl.vsnl.net.in Thu Aug 16 15:00:37 2007 From: esg at bgl.vsnl.net.in (ESG India VSNL) Date: Thu, 16 Aug 2007 15:00:37 +0530 Subject: [Urbanstudy] [Fwd: Town planning flies out of the window] Message-ID: <46C4193D.2070906@bgl.vsnl.net.in> http://www.thehindu.com/2007/08/16/stories/2007081650230100.htm * Town planning flies out of the window * Afshan Yasmeen /Several loose ends as Government notifies rules on unauthorised constructions / — FILE Photo: V. Sreenivasa Murthy * /LEGALISING VIOLATIONS:/ Scenes such as this building being demolished in Bangalore will be a thing of the past. * BANGALORE: In what is being seen by citizens’ groups as a setback to regulated urban development, the State Government on Tuesday notified final rules for regularising unauthorised constructions by levying compounding fees. This has been done overlooking over 500 objections and suggestions from various civic organisations and even from the Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagara Palike (BBMP). Implications The implications of this move are far-reaching. Residential buildings with violations of up to 50 per cent and commercial buildings with deviations of up to 25 per cent can now be regularised by simply paying a fee. According to the rules, the compounding fee (penalty) ranges from Rs. 100 a square metre to Rs. 600 a sq. m depending on the size of the area and of the plot or building. The State Government amended the Karnataka Town and Country Planning and Other Laws Act, 2004 during its Belgaum session in September last year to facilitate regularisation. The draft rules were published on May 17 and the public was given a June 17 deadline to file objections and suggestions. Called the new Karnataka Town and Country Planning (Regularisation of Unauthorised Development or Constructions) Rules, 2007, the scheme will come into effect from September 15. Thereafter, violators of building bye-laws can benefit from the scheme in three months. The new rules will not only enable regularisation of building deviations but will also legalise change in land use. This means violations pertaining to setback, floor area ratio (FAR), change in land use and even basement parking can be regularised. Simply put, regulated town planning will fly out of the window. For example, a commercial unit in a quiet residential area can function without legal hurdles. Although the rules say that all this will be done keeping in mind the regulations in the Comprehensive Development Plan (CDP), it is not clear whether this refers to the revised Master Plan or the old CDP. The final rules specify the setting up of an appellate authority to oversee the decision of screening committees, define the competent authority and prescribe the payment of application scrutiny fee. Objections The draft rules had already caused some disquiet among civic groups who felt they would only encourage more people to become law-breakers. The groups apprehend that the rules would change the basic structure of a designated area (following change in land use) and affect the quality of life. The rules do not specify whether the regularisation is a one-time process or is continuous and in perpetuity. The Government has not stipulated a cut-off date after which no violations will be regularised. The rules are accessible only on the State Government website www.municipaladmn.kar . nic.in According to official sources, the implementation of the new rules will be difficult as there are several loose ends. These include issues pertaining to identifying, certifying and verifying the violations in buildings that have deviated more than the prescribed 50 per cent (residential) and 25 per cent (commercial). The rules do not provide for setting up a panel of architects to certify the violations. Some relief The only relief for the local bodies is that this scheme does not apply to buildings on encroached government land, valleys, drains, tank beds, lands that have high tension electrical lines, buildings under dispute, forest land and buildings coming in the alignment of a proposed road or rail network, the sources said. / / Printer friendly page ************************************************************** Scanned by eScan Anti-Virus and Content Security Software. Visit http://www.mwti.net for more info on eScan and MailScan. ************************************************************** -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/urbanstudygroup/attachments/20070816/15967c89/attachment-0002.html -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: 2007081650230101.jpg Type: image/jpeg Size: 26651 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/urbanstudygroup/attachments/20070816/15967c89/attachment-0002.jpg From sebydesiolim at hotmail.com Tue Aug 21 17:10:09 2007 From: sebydesiolim at hotmail.com (sebastian Rodrigues) Date: Tue, 21 Aug 2007 17:10:09 +0530 Subject: [Urbanstudy] Dempos swallows Bicholim town, villages Message-ID: Popularly known for thier generosity in promoting football in Goa, Dempo mining group is gradually swallowing Bicholim's precious resources. It has large number of mining leases in this taluka in Northen Goa. However Dempos have created hell like situation for the residents and farmers are forced to stop paddy on its fertile soil due to mining silts. Its roads are burdened with mining silt all the time and even dangerous during monsoon rains leading to large number of accident cases. In the non rainy days the air is full of nasty mining dust that has created large number people with severe health risks. In and around Bicholim town for example Dempo mining corporation has approximately 550 hactares of area under mining lease. It is spread out in the municipal limits of Bicholim Municipal corporation, Lamgao, villages of Mayem, Bordem, Mulgao and Sirigao. Even the public roads are within the mining lease of Dempos, one example to this effect is road from NSP Dempo Gate to Cine Hira Talkies in Bicholim town. Dempo mining has led to large scale water depletion as high voltage water sucking pumps are installed inside the mines to carry on deeper mechanised mining activities. Last month teacher Ramesh Gauns has filed police case for spreading silt on public roads in Bicholim and it is pending in the Court of the Executive Megistrate, Bicholim taluka, Bicholim. Dempos are responsible for causing irreversible threats to natural lakes in Mulgao as well as in Mayem due to its reckless mining activities. Natural water sources have gone dry in Pilgaon village. Its greening policies and nonesense as it promotes monocultures hostile to nature in every sense. Entire Bordem village is disrupted becuse of mining and landslides caused due to mining in 1991. The huge paddy field lies uncultivated and even people are displaced from thier original settlements. Here is a picture of Bordem mine and high powered water pump in operation for you to see: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-view_blog_post_image.php?imgId=4 All this for exports of Iron Ore first to Japan and in the last few years to China. Sebastian Rodrigues Visit my blog at http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-view_blog.php?blogId=17 _________________________________________________________________ Catch all the cricketing action right here. Live score, match reports, photos et al. http://content.msn.co.in/Sports/Cricket/Default.aspx From esg at bgl.vsnl.net.in Tue Aug 21 20:34:45 2007 From: esg at bgl.vsnl.net.in (ESG India VSNL) Date: Tue, 21 Aug 2007 20:34:45 +0530 Subject: [Urbanstudy] VERY IMPORTANT MEETING NOTICE FROM BBMP Message-ID: <46CAFF0D.2030408@bgl.vsnl.net.in> Dear All, Please find enclosed an invitation from the DCF (Tree Officer) Bruhat Blore Mahanagara Palike for a meeting that will decide the "removal" of trees for the Metro project and "developmental activities in BBMP area". In some ways it is a small victory of sorts, as this meeting is called despite the BBMP having issued orders to fell trees in Sheshadri Road, Palace Road, etc. A joint inspection by the Engineering Staff of BBMP (Road Widening division) and Tree Officer of BBMP along with ESG and CIVIC representatives, has probably resulted in this new thinking to consult the wide public. There is something very important to notice in the letter however: the description includes almost every tree in public and private lands in Bangalore city area. We need to have a formal, prepared and effective response to these proposals. The meeting is scheduled for Friday 24th August 2007, and it is a very important forum for us to utilise and bring some rationale and sense into the ongoing tree felling efforts (contrast this with the tree growing efforts of the government of the 1980s!). Sincerely Leo F. Saldanha Environment Support Group -------- Original Message -------- Subject: :SPAM: Meeting Notice Date: Tue, 21 Aug 2007 05:25:26 +0100 (BST) From: Deputy Conservator of Forests forests To: esg at esgindia.org *BRUHAT **BANGALORE ** MAHANAGARA PALIKE* No/DCF/PR- /07-08 Office of the Deputy Conservator of Forest Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagara Palike Bangalore. Dated: 17-08-07 *To,* Sri /Smt *Sir/Madam* * * *Sub*:- Review of removal of Trees for road widening and for * *Metro Rail Corporation Ltd. A meeting is convened *on **24-08-07 at 11.30 am* in the meeting hall No-1 of BBMP. The agenda of the meeting is as below. 1. Removal of trees for widening of road as per the instructions of Govt. 2. Removal of trees obstructing Metro rail Corporation works. 3. Removal of trees for developmental activities in BBMP area. You are requested to attend the meeting and to offer your valuable suggestions in the matter. Your truly Deputy Conservator of Forest Bruhat Bangalore Mahanagara Palike *Copy with complements communicated to:**-* * * 1. The Executive Engineer, (road works) Bangalore with request to attend the meeting on the said date. ************************************************************** Scanned by eScan Anti-Virus and Content Security Software. Visit http://www.mwti.net for more info on eScan and MailScan. ************************************************************** From esg at bgl.vsnl.net.in Thu Aug 23 15:34:21 2007 From: esg at bgl.vsnl.net.in (ESG India VSNL) Date: Thu, 23 Aug 2007 15:34:21 +0530 Subject: [Urbanstudy] Parliament of India Q & A Bulletin XI.2 Message-ID: <46CD5BA5.9070106@bgl.vsnl.net.in> Dear All, Please find enclosed the 2nd Bulletin in our series of XI Parliament Session Q & A updates service. The issues covered are indicated in the Indexes to Q & A (enclosed). We hope this compilation is of use to you. All comments, questions and feedback may kindly be sent to Nandini (nandini at esindia.org). Best wishes Leo Saldanha -- Environment Support Group (R) 105, East End B Main Road Jayanagar 9th Block East Bangalore 560069. INDIA Telefax: 91-80-26341977/26531339/26534364 Email: esg at esgindia.org or esg at bgl.vsnl.net.in Web: www.esgindia.org *Index to Questions* */ /* *Date* *Ministry Name* *Keywords in the question* *16 August 2007* *Ministry of Petroleum & Natural Gas * *Oil Exploration <#A1> * *Krishna Godavari basin project <#A2>* *Ship Recycling <#A3>* *Oil & Gas pricing <#A4>* *Promotion of non fossil fuel <#A5>* *16 August 2007* *Ministry of Chemical and Fertilizers* *Haldia petrochemical project <#A6>* *16 August 2007* *Ministry of Tourism* *Rural Tourism Scheme <#A7>* *16 August 2007* * * *Ministry of Railways* *Utilisation of surplus railway land <#A8>* *16 August 2007* *Ministry of Civil Aviation* *Devanahalli Airport <#A9>* *16 & 17 August 2007* * * *Ministry of Urban Development, Housing and Poverty alleviation* *Water supply schemes <#A10>* *Infrastructure development <#A11>* *JNNURM <#A12>* *Hyderabad Metro Rail <#A13>* *Bangalore <#A14>* *Delhi slums <#A15>* *Urban Housing policy <#A16>* *Slums <#A17>* *Right to Shelter <#A18>* *Urban poor <#A19>* *17 August 2007* *Ministry of Earth Sciences* *Soil erosion in coastal areas <#A20>* *Climatic Change <#A21>* *17 August 2007* *Ministry of Power* *Thermal projects <#A22>* *Hydropower projects <#A23>* *17 August 2007* *Ministry of Finance* *NGO Funds <#A24>* *Karnataka Finance Commission <#A25>* *World Bank loans <#A26>* *17 August 2007* *Ministry of Rural Development* *Karnataka Swajaldhara <#A27>* *SEZ <#A28>* *National Rehabilitation policy <#A29>* * * *17 August 2007* *Ministry of New & Renewable Energy* *Biofuels <#A30>* *17 & 20 August 2007* *Ministry of Agriculture* *Multi State World Bank project <#A31>* *SEZ <#A32>* *Kolleru Lake displacement <#A33>* *20 August 2007* *Ministry of Water Resources* *Interlinking of Rivers <#A34>* *Water resources <#A35>* *Upper Bhadra project <#A36>* *Kabini project <#A37>* *20 August 2007* *Ministry of Labour* *Contract Labour <#A38> * *17 August 2007* *Ministry of Health and Family Welfare* *World Bank <#A39>* *AIDS Bill <#A40>* *16 August 2007* *The Prime Minister* *Pruning of Central Schemes <#A41>* *Atomic Energy <#A42>* *Dumping of Waste <#A43>* *Climate Change <#A44>* *Forests & Wildlife <#A45>* *NLCP Karnataka <#A46>* *EIA Notification 2006 <#A47>* * * *Index to Answers* * * * * *Date* *Ministry Name* *Keywords in the question* *13 August 2007* *Ministry of Mines* *Illegal mining in Karnataka <#a1>* * * *Violation of Leasing Norms <#a2> * * * *Mining Projects in Andhra Pradesh <#Z1>* * * *13 August 2007* *Ministry of Social Justice & Empowerment* *Norms for aid to NGOS <#Z2>* *10 August 2007* *Ministry of Railways* *Train to Devanahalli airport <#Z3>* -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/urbanstudygroup/attachments/20070823/e284a95f/attachment-0002.html -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: POI_Q_A_BulletinXI.2_200807.rtf Type: application/msword Size: 121748 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/urbanstudygroup/attachments/20070823/e284a95f/attachment-0002.dot From elkamath at yahoo.com Fri Aug 24 08:04:12 2007 From: elkamath at yahoo.com (lalitha kamath) Date: Thu, 23 Aug 2007 19:34:12 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Urbanstudy] on the sub-prime crash Message-ID: <794971.65402.qm@web53612.mail.re2.yahoo.com> FYI OUT NOW ON METAMUTE.ORG: Living in a Bubble: Credit, Debt and Crisis - Mute Vol 2 #6 Panic in the credit markets! Sub-prime crash! The new issue of Mute is on the money and online soon. In Living in a Bubble: Credit, Debt and Crisis we look at the social costs of an era of debt-backed boom now showing signs of busting. As a downpayment on the future we are publishing some articles from the issue ahead of time... http://metamute.org * Fictitious Capital For Beginners: Imperialism, 'Anti-Imperialism', and the Continuing Relevance of Rosa Luxemburg By Loren Goldner The liquidity crisis currently wiping billions off global stock markets is just the tip of a very big iceberg. Beneath the credit crunch and incipient insolvency crisis lie the economic and political crisis of the USAâ€*s global reign, claims Loren Goldner. But will this mean global depression, wars and intensified authoritarianism, or a renewed opportunity for communism? Goldner returns to the theories of Marx and Luxemburg to examine today's financial and military imperialism, and its left wing â€*anti-imperialistâ€* mirror http://www.metamute.org/en/Fictitious-Capital-For-Beginners * Risky Business By Stanley Morgan With the prospect of earning over the odds on derivatives trading, hedge fund managers are employing ever more high-tech means to calculate risk and predict stock market activity. But Wall Streetâ€*s faith in its own predictive powers often blinds investors to the fundamental laws of investment, says risk specialist Stanley Morgan http://www.metamute.org/en/Risky-Business * Waiting For the End of the World By Jeff Strahl Would a financial crisis mean recession, depression or revolution? And havenâ€*t we been waiting a long time for this liberating, or devastating, catastrophe? Jeff Strahl surveys the prophets and naysayers and gives his own take on â€*a global crisis of unprecedented proportionsâ€* http://www.metamute.org/en/Waiting-For-the-End-of-the-World * The Three P's - Private Equity, PFI and Pensions by Rob Ray As money expands, society contracts. In the UK the unholy trinity of Private Finance Initiatives, Private Equity and Pensions embodies this logic, turning jobs, services and infrastructure into factories for finance capital. Rob Ray explains how the 3 P's interact to pile up corporate fortunes and devolve risk on to the rest of us http://www.metamute.org/en/The-3-Ps * The Magic of Debt, or Amortise This! Today we donâ€*t feel guilty about incurring debts, just the opposite – indebtedness is the entry price of being a good citizen, pulling more and more of us into the global financial system. Here Brett Neilson offers some philsophical and political tools for disowning a debt which can never be repaid http://www.metamute.org/en/The-Magic-of-Debt-or-Amortise-This * Speculating on Student Debt Far from being a right, British higher education in the age of top-up fees is a commodity with a hefty price tag attached. For most students, write the Committee for Radical Diplomacy, it offers a basic schooling in debt and recasts learning as a down-payment on a dubious future http://www.metamute.org/en/The-Magic-of-Debt-or-Amortise-This * OR SUBSCRIBE HERE: http://metamute.org/taxonomy/term/3480 FOR A LIST OF STOCKISTS: http://metamute.org/node/254 ____________________________________________________________________________________Ready for the edge of your seat? Check out tonight's top picks on Yahoo! TV. http://tv.yahoo.com/ -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/urbanstudygroup/attachments/20070823/5d797c8d/attachment-0002.html From esg at bgl.vsnl.net.in Mon Aug 27 19:18:59 2007 From: esg at bgl.vsnl.net.in (ESG India VSNL) Date: Mon, 27 Aug 2007 19:18:59 +0530 Subject: [Urbanstudy] Parliament Q & A Bulletin Xi.3_240807 Message-ID: <46D2D64B.4030709@bgl.vsnl.net.in> Dear All Please find enclosed the 3rd Bulletin of Q & A in the Parliament Q & A series. We wil appreciate feedback on the utility of tihs compilation. Please email nandini at esgindia.org in this regard. Thank you Leo Saldanha -- Environment Support Group (R) 105, East End B Main Road Jayanagar 9th Block East Bangalore 560069. INDIA Telefax: 91-80-224441977/26531339/26534364 Email: esg at esgindia.org or esg at bgl.vsnl.net.in Web: www.esgindia.org -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: POI_Q_A_BulletinXI.3_240807.rtf Type: application/msword Size: 187536 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/urbanstudygroup/attachments/20070827/562ab512/attachment-0002.dot From sebydesiolim at hotmail.com Tue Aug 28 21:41:31 2007 From: sebydesiolim at hotmail.com (sebastian Rodrigues) Date: Tue, 28 Aug 2007 21:41:31 +0530 Subject: [Urbanstudy] Indian Environment and Forest Ministry betrays Sarwan, Goa Message-ID: Ministry of Environment and Forest (MoEF) over ruled all the objections of the Sarvan villagers and gave green signal for starting of mining legally to Goa bussiness group of Zatye but actually to be operated by on Trimurthy. It is 72 hactares Sarwan Iron Ore and Manganese Ore Mine. Villagers and People concerned about Environment have been protesting the commisioning of mine at Sarwan for past few years. Last August 05 2007 core area - survey number 64 of T.C. No. 28/1953 - of mining went under the flooded Bicholim River. Here is the picture taken then: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-view_blog_post_image.php?imgId=28 Environment ministry in its decision dated 21 August 2007 granted permission to M/s Zatye & Company Pvt. Ltd the necssarry environment clearance for commisining of mine under the condition that keeps safety zone of 50 meters between mine working and the Bicholim river. The travesty of truth is that thare is no 50 meter distance between the border as visible in the above picture and the Bicholim river. This mine is proposed to be commisioned at the capital cost of Rs.278 lakh and will generate the waste of 13.1 million tonnes out of which 10 million will be dumped on the land in the form of overburden and the rest will be dumped inside the mining pit. The clearance to the Sarvan mine also mean 40 houses with about 100 Sarwan villagers living adjacent to the mining lease land of survey number 99 in survey number 102 will have to get out soon if they decide to accept the verdict of MoEF. MoEF is satisfied with its investigations and found that this mine was in operation during Portuguese colonial times in mid 1950s. Half a century later Indian government thinks it fit to revive the same - thus perpetualte the neo colonial legacy. In early 2007 villagers came out the street of Bicholim to protest the mining proposal. Here is the picture a protestor: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-view_blog_post_image.php?imgId=34 Soon the public hearing was held wherein the mining proposal was vehemently opposed. Here is the picture of gathering at Public hearing: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-view_blog_post_image.php?imgId=35 MoEF gave permision for mining in not only roughriding Peoples opposition for mining but also neglecting topographic evidence of forest existing the mining lease area. Here is the picture of Sarvan's fragile Forest: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-view_blog_post_image.php?imgId=36 There is also very important underground Cave network in the proposed Sarwan mine area jurisdiction. This is going to be completely lost forever to the planet: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-view_blog_post_image.php?imgId=37 Proposed Zatye mining site in Sarvan also has an old temple - a place of worship on the banks. It is a rich human heritage to be lost due to mining. See the beauty for yourself: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-view_blog_post_image.php?imgId=38 Hoticulture in the form of 'Kulagars' here fetch Rs. 1 crore to the Sarvan village. It has well developed irrigation networks. Have a look at this irrigation for cultivation: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-view_blog_post_image.php?imgId=39 In the hottest months in Goa temperature in this forest does ranges between 15 degrees to 28 degree. It is forest with wild flowers. Here is picture: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-view_blog_post_image.php?imgId=40 Cattles too come here to cool themselves in fresh water. Here they are relaxing: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-view_blog_post_image.php?imgId=41 Do you think mining should come up in Sarvan? Dont's we rob our future generations of somethings valuable? What answer do we have to offer when he will ask us 'Why din't you protect our mountains?' Do we have a courage to look at his face: http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-view_blog_post_image.php?imgId=42 Sarwan forest will loose Forest, Villages of Sarvan and Vattadev, Will deposit huge silt in Bicholim river, will throughly disturb catchment area of Bicholim river which is an important tributories of Mandovi river. Do ponder. Think. Then write your protests to the MoEF officials in Delhi at their email plahujarai at yahoo.com Express yourself so your till your voice is heard by those in power. Sebastian Rodrigues Visit my blog at http://www.openspaceforum.net/twiki/tiki-view_blog.php?blogId=17 _________________________________________________________________ Catch all the cricketing action right here. Live score, match reports, photos et al. http://content.msn.co.in/Sports/Cricket/Default.aspx From priya at cm.sarai.net Thu Aug 30 10:00:36 2007 From: priya at cm.sarai.net (Priya Sen) Date: Thu, 30 Aug 2007 10:00:36 +0530 Subject: [Urbanstudy] Nanocity outside Chandigarh? - from Gautam Bhan Message-ID: <46D647EC.7010501@cm.sarai.net> Dear All, This is my first posting on the list but I wanted to write in and see what you all know about Nanocity, a proposed 11,000 "metropolis" being built 20km or so outside Chandigarh by Sabeer Bhatia, the Hotmail millionairre. I'm a student at UC berkeley here in the US in the urban planning program, and people here are involved in the design of this city, which seems to have land clearance from the governent and is claiming to be ready by 2012 at the cost of over $1bn. Now, in India and the Indian press, I haven't seen much or any public dialogue about this - -for a project of this magnitude it strikes me as odd because it seems to be going much beyond the IT park/SEZ/Township models that we're used to, and I'm wondering why there is such silence about it. There must be issues of diplacement of people and land use involved, without even talking about what it means for a private millionairre to decide to build a "21st century metropolis." Can anyone enlighten? If everyone else is as much out of the loop as I have been, I think its time we start taking Mr Bhatia's plan seriously and trying to understand what's apparently going on in our backyard. best, Gautam From samirfayaz at yahoo.com Fri Aug 31 04:24:33 2007 From: samirfayaz at yahoo.com (Samir Shaikh) Date: Thu, 30 Aug 2007 15:54:33 -0700 (PDT) Subject: [Urbanstudy] Deccan Traverses: The Making of Bangalore's Terrain Message-ID: <630160.8819.qm@web34615.mail.mud.yahoo.com> Has anyone read this book? Any opinions? Deccan Traverses: The Making of Bangalore's Terrain by Anuradha Mathur and Dilip Da Cunha New Delhi: Rupa, 2006 Here's a review in the Harvard Design Magazine (also see attached pdf) source: http://www.gsd.harvard.edu/research/publications/hdm/current/26_Correa.html): - Samir Shaikh Reviewed by Felipe Correa Deccan Traverses: The Making of Bangalore's Terrain by Anuradha Mathur and Dilip Da Cunha New Delhi: Rupa, 2006 Deccan Traverses: The Making of Bangalore’s Terrain presents a thoroughly unique reading of Bangalore, India’s “Garden City,” and the multiple intellectual and material constructs that have shaped it. Furthermore, the scope and ambition of the work presented in the book (which parallels an exhibition that opened in India and Philadelphia), goes beyond Bangalore itself—it questions the role of landscape architecture as a last act of design and reframes it as a basic initiator of settlement. This intriguing view of the Indian city and its multiple forms of urbanism pointedly criticizes India’s time-honored reliability on the imported master plan exemplified by erroneous interpretations of Le Corbusier’s Chandigarh or the most recent TVA-inspired Tehri Dam in northern India. As a potential alternative, India-born, Philadelphia-based designers Anuradha Mathur and Dilip Da Cunha propose an inventive use of the diagram as a transformative tool that can distill and restructure an array of organizational systems already at play within an extended urban field where the boundaries between consolidated city and open territory are hard or impossible to define. Always resisting the most straightforward and obvious historical associations, the authors go beyond the everyday life of Bangalore and dig into the material qualities that are imperceptible to the naked eye but can be rendered visible through multiple mapping techniques. In doing so, they construct a “thick” visual and written narrative that goes back more than three hundred years to trace the most significant colonial enterprises that have motivated this terrain to transmute from “Naked Country” to “Garden City” and most recently to a “Technology Capital.” Mathur and Da Cunha’s inventive work cuts through multiple agencies and actions that throughout time have been taken to represent Bangalore’s material and cultural milieu. They reassemble the city into a set of animate fields that depict a wide range of ongoing negotiations between an aggregation of historic and current social and political pressure systems and the different geographies/geometries ubiquitous to each. As one travels through the rich accumulation of archival and cartographic material, one encounters an elaborate array of images, drawings, mappings, and diagrams that go beyond the fixed conventions of visual logic and the use of normative symbols. The work aggressively favors representational tools that are deeply infused by the ecologies being explored, yet it remains faithful to the interpretative and transformational strength of architectural modes of representation. As the work moves from the realm of the real into the representational, each terrain is intensely thickened by a well-calibrated injection of material and cultural events, resulting in a critical redefinition of the burrowed site, and the surfacing of the multiple entities that compose it. The Scope and ambition of the work presented in the book, goes beyond Banglore itself—it questions the role of landscape architecture as a last act of design and reframes it a a basic initiator of settlement. Perhaps the most significant claim made in the project is that Bangalore is as a much a cultivated eye as it is a cultivated land. The authors, by revisiting many of the most salient historical milestones of the city, astutely capture the dual nature of the multiple expeditions that slowly transformed this territory into India’s Garden City. If the initial objective of these extraordinary pioneers was either to exploit the territory, in the case of the East India Company, or to set forth projects of global significance, such as measuring the curvature of the earth or documenting local cultural ways, each of these actions had a primordial role in the emergence of this landscape. All these actions left significant physical and cultural imprints in the region. The steady accretion of imported measurements, materials, skills, and images slowly amalgamated into a physical-material construct that makes up contemporary Bangalore. A highly significant example is the many surveyor drawings of Bangalore. Even though these maps were originally done in behalf of for the East India Company, they had a much broader impact in the local culture—they were the most precise and effective records of the city’s morphology and served as a primary resource for decades to come. The most intriguing issues in the book emerge from the authors’ ability to go beyond individual colonial undertakings and construct a visual profile that selectively imbricates the contents of the different expeditions and discoveries that have unfolded throughout the last four centuries. In doing so, they highlight their active role in the shaping of the physical and dynamic structures of the terrain. War, Surveying, Picturing, and Botanizing are the four main chapters in the book and reveal the most salient actions that have shaped Bangalore and the broader Deccan Plateau; these are imaginatively appropriated by the authors to inform the book’s “the sites to be investigated.” War: This section documents the first set of urbanistic actions, military in this case, which defined the foundation and growth of Bangalore. Its development is staged as a highly animate material event rather than a bound spatial entity. In doing so, Mathur and Da Cunha rigorously challenge the traditional definition of the Maidan (an open area in or near a town, often used for collective events) as a fixed spatial type. Furthermore, they reconstruct it as a field condition that throughout history has accommodated the unfolding of a mixed set of urban events with varied intensities and rhythms. Even today, the Maidan continues to act as the most significant public realm within the Bangalorean collective. This particular point is exquisitely profiled in two large-format silkscreen prints that carefully single out and calibrate the morphological changes of the four main roads that define the origins of the city and that throughout the years have served as a backdrop for a wide array of urban events. Survey: This section reconstructs the multiple geodesic expeditions that traversed this territory and single out their agency in establishing an infrastructural framework that goes beyond the specific artistic/scientific objectives of the mission itself. British explorers established various measuring devices that brought together a wide set of physical and social dynamics into a single picture plane. Through multiple cartographic devices, including triangulation, explorers could effectively track diachronically the fluctuations of fluvial systems, climatic variations, and the proliferation of diseases and their potential medicines. The authors critically reframe the expeditioner’s role as a generator of an abstract infrastructural machine that can simultaneously track and inform a broad set of physical and social dimensions. Ultimately, the findings of the expeditioners laid out a latent infrastructure that played a significant role in the urban forms adopted by future settlers. Resisiting the most straightforward and obvious historical associations, the authors go beyond the everyday life of Bangalore and dig into the material qualities that are imperceptible to the naked eye but can be rendered visible through multiple mapping techiniques. Picture: This section engages Picturesque Painting, a nascent genre in 18th-century England, as an art form that holds an inherent potential to serve as both an aesthetic and a scientific practice. The authors focus on the latter, and redefine it as a significantly effective device able to isolate, archive, and transplant elements within the landscape, creating an effective visual survey of the terrain at play. In re-traversing the grounds explored primarily by British artist Thomas Daniell, the authors re-present the multiple elements that make up Bangalore’s ground, singling out the most significant material constructs in the city. One of the most compelling stories told in this portion of the book reveals how the plethora of small bodies of water, ubiquitous to current Bangalore and perceived as an original ecology in the city, are in reality an artificial hydrologic network that tailored the grounds for denser settlement and agricultural production. Every tank is both an individual entity and a key player in a much broader hydrological/political system; the result is a checkerboard of disrupted ownerships. Garden: This section uses the Lalbagh, the most prominent public garden in the city, as a point of departure for a visual and textual narrative that effectively conveys the complex botanical matrix that has resulted from the introduction, acclimatization, and dissemination of the flora that today make up Bangalore’s botanical carpet. The book astutely reveals how Bangalore, by serving as a “botanical depot” that deliberately collected flora from geographies as far away as South America, slowly transformed from “naked country” to “garden city.” The narrative further describes social practices that emerged from botanical explorations and depicts how these are still active in everyday Bangalore. As the heavily saturated pages of this volume permeate our active perception, two broader questions arise: What is the significance of “exhibition” as a critical form of practice in this particular context and in the design disciplines at large? Does this disciplinary endeavor generate enough traction to critically engage, intervene, and induce a larger transformation in Bangalore’s terrain? The authors are conspicuously silent about both questions, and perhaps the tentative success of their form of practice lies in the abstract, yet generative manner in which they address the potentiality of design in a context where top-down interventions seem not to affect the intrinsic material forces of the city. On the one hand, through the introduction of a large number of synthetic drawings, the book goes beyond its archival origins and cleverly transcends the boundaries of mute documentation. On the other, Mathur and Da Cunha intentionally stop short of synthesizing their findings in concrete design proposals for Bangalore and the broader Deccan Plateau. As an alternative to “pure notation” or a “finite project,” the authors seem to appropriate a middle ground that claims the diagram as an essential tool that can fuel the transition from the archival act of documentation into a speculative act of design. It is through the authors’ ability to endorse engagement rather than objectification that this project can successfully cast significant influence in Bangalore’s design community at large, and in doing so fuel a greater degree of awareness towards of their most immediate environment. Acting as a Deluzian transgressive device, this seamless accretion of interpretative drawings specifies particular operations that negotiate between Bangalore’s semi-consolidated urban matter and its abundance of unfastened activities. More importantly, by being simultaneously determinate and indeterminate, these depictions also allow a space for active viewers to ask critical questions from a fresh vantage point and use this work as a vehicle to reinterpret their most immediate pedestrian realities. For example, the reexamination of former triangulation measurements reveals a very clear attitude towards the region’s topography and can shed significant light on infrastructural projects and how these can be tailored to better fit this rugged terrain. Mathur and Da Cunha cleverly allow induction to displace deduction to provide an ample cultural and physical framework that can provoke and inform future urban transformations and tactically hint at specific projects. Through the instrumental use of the diagram, the authors can reveal unfamiliar relationships among highly familiar objects, and in doing so propose a world other than what exists: a flipside cosmos that allows for new realities, and in doing so, sets forth an alternative method that can help us move away from the most aphasic forms of development that seem to dominate Bangalore’s and many other current urban scenarios. ____________________________________________________________________________________ Looking for a deal? Find great prices on flights and hotels with Yahoo! FareChase. http://farechase.yahoo.com/ -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/urbanstudygroup/attachments/20070830/0d108f44/attachment-0002.html -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: 26_Correa.pdf Type: application/pdf Size: 54898 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/urbanstudygroup/attachments/20070830/0d108f44/attachment-0002.pdf From nath at computer.org Fri Aug 31 22:49:37 2007 From: nath at computer.org (CPC) Date: Fri, 31 Aug 2007 10:19:37 -0700 Subject: [Urbanstudy] Nanocity outside Chandigarh? - from Gautam Bhan In-Reply-To: <46D647EC.7010501@cm.sarai.net> References: <46D647EC.7010501@cm.sarai.net> Message-ID: Here are the references to nanocity. With so much in the news, how can you say, media is quiet. regards chandra Overseas Indian: Connecting India with its Diaspora *Sabeer Bhatia* to set up *Nanocity*. *Chandigarh*, Sep 01: Sabir *Bhatia*, who revolutionised e-mailing, will help the Haryana government set up a Rs.50 billion *...* www.overseasindian.in/2006/sept/news/news3.shtml - 21k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this *Sabeer Bhatia* - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia *Sabeer* was born in *Chandigarh*, India in 1968. His father, Baldev *Bhatia *, *...* The aim of *Nanocity* is to replicate the vibrance and eco-system of innovation *...* en.wikipedia.org/wiki/*Sabeer*_*Bhatia* - 23k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this India eNews - *Sabeer Bhatia* to help set up *Nanocity* in Haryana *Chandigarh* - Sabir *Bhatia*, who revolutionised e-mailing, will help the Haryana government set up a Rs.50 billion ($1.07 billion) *Nanocity* - an infotech part *...* www.indiaenews.com/business/20060901/20609.htm - 23k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this *[PDF]* *Sabeer Bhatia* to help set up *Nanocity* in HaryanaFile Format: PDF/Adobe Acrobat - View as HTML *Sabeer Bhatia* to help set up *Nanocity* in Haryana. *Chandigarh* - Sabir * Bhatia*, who revolutionised e-mailing, will help the Haryana government set up a *...* www.indiaenews.com/pdf/20609.pdf - Similar pages- Note this *Sabeer Bhatia* to help set up *Nanocity* in Haryana : India *Chandigarh*, Aug 31 Sabir *Bhatia*, who revolutionised e-mailing, will help the *...* *Chandigarh* |10 months ago *Sabeer Bhatia* to help set up * Nanocity* in Haryana *...* www.nerve.in/news:25350014170 - 35k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this India CurrentsSee how *Sabeer Bhatia*'s new line, *Nanocity*, tends to be a conversation stopper at *...* At 11000 acres, *Nanocity*, 16 miles southeast of * Chandigarh* (*Bhatia*'s *...* www.indiacurrents.com/news/view_article.html?article_id=d6ae69127f652b47ab64f742229d1e03&from=rss- 35k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this *Sabeer Bhatia* to help set up *Nanocity* in Haryana | Indian Muslims *Sabeer Bhatia* to help set up *Nanocity* in Haryana. Posted August 31st, 2006 by aftababedin. Economy. *Chandigarh*, September 1 (IANS) Sabir *Bhatia *, *...* www.indianmuslims.info/news/2006/september/01/economy/*sabeer*_*bhatia* _to_help_set_up_*nanocity*_in_haryana.html - 15k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this *Sabeer Bhatia* to help set up *Nanocity* in Haryana *Sabeer Bhatia* to help set up *Nanocity* in Haryana. *Chandigarh*, September 1 (IANS) Sabir *Bhatia*, who revolutionised e-mailing, will help the Haryana *...* www.indianmuslims.info/book/export/html/6778 - 3k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this Nano City - *Sabeer Bhatia* *Sabeer Bhatia*. The co-founder of Hotmail, *Sabeer* is best described as a "lifelong *...* in a new city called "Nano City" - to be built outside of * Chandigarh*. *...* www.*nanocity*.in/promoters.html - 11k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this *Sabeer Bhatia* plans Nano city for Haryana by Charanjit Ahuja *...* *nanocity*.in. VISION DESIGN PHILOSOPHY INFRASTRUCTURE GOALS PROGRESS THE PROMOTERS. HOME IDEAS FROM YOU FEEDBACK, CONTACT US PRESS LINKS PICTURE GALLERY *...* www.*nanocity*.in/press-media-links/*sabeer*-*bhatia*- plans-nano-city-for-haryana.html - 6k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this Did you mean to search for: *Nano city*, Chandigarh by Sabeer Bhatia *Sabeer Bhatia* blog,*Sabeer Bhatia* web site blog,*Sabeer Bhatia* *...*14. Comment on Where is *Sabeer Bhatia* ? by JBN Well the plans of building * nanocity* will be in graveyard soon because of politics that is occuring in Haryana *...* www.peopleandprofiles.com/ProfileLinks-28/*Sabeer*+*Bhatia*.html?profile_id=156&type=blog&movie=&st=0 - 34k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this *Sabeer Bhatia* links,*Sabeer Bhatia* web site links,*Sabeer Bhatia* *...* *Sabeer Bhatia* to help set up *Nanocity* in Haryana - India News ... * Chandigarh*, Aug 31 (IANS) Sabir *Bhatia*, who revolutionised e-mailing, will help . *...* www.peopleandprofiles.com/.../*Sabeer*+*Bhatia*.html?profile_id=156&type=link&st=60&linkid=28 - 31k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this *Sabeer Bhatia*, The Man Behind Hotmail -Googling India *Sabeer Bhatia* was born in *Chandigarh* in the year 1969. *...* planning to build a new city in Haryana, India called Nano city at http://www.*nanocity*.in . *...* www.googling.in/.../great_indian_business_legends/*sabeer*_*bhatia*_the_man_behind_hotmail.html - 31k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this The Tribune, *Chandigarh*, India - BusinessHSIIDC, *Sabeer Bhatia* ink pact *Chandigarh*, November 1 *....* has earlier been cleared by the Haryana Investment Promotion Board christened as '*Nanocity*.IN'. *...* www.tribuneindia.com/2006/20061102/biz.htm - 61k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this The Tribune, *Chandigarh*, India - Haryana *Chandigarh*, August 31 *Sabeer Bhatia*'s latest IT venture — Nano City — will *....* A special purpose vehicle, *Nanocity*.in, would be formed by the HSIIDC and *...* www.tribuneindia.com/2006/20060901/haryana.htm - 58k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this *Sabeer Bhatia* The pioneer in the field of web based e-mail service *Sabeer Bhatia* was born in 1969 in *Chandigarh*, India to Indian Army officer father Baldev *Bhatia* and *...* www.indianetzone.com/5/*sabeer*_*bhatia*.htm - 21k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this My Articles: *Sabeer Bhatia* *Sabeer* was born in 1969 at *Chandigarh* to Balev *Bhatia* & Daman *Bhatia*. *....* The aim of *Nanocity* is to replicate the vibrance and eco-system of innovation *...* sachi-writer.blogspot.com/2007/04/*sabeer*-*bhatia*.html - 78k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this Hotmail co-founder helping India to create forward-looking cityIf *Sabeer Bhatia's* vision comes true, 5000 acres of Himalayan foothills could *...* India near the city of his birth, *Chandigarh*, in the state of Haryana. *...* news-service.stanford.edu/news/2006/october4/*bhatia*-100406.html - 13k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this Gurgaon Community Portal || News, Views, Reviews, Comments *...* *Sabeer Bhatia* plans for *nanocity* in rural region of panchkula would be highly *...* The whole belt of *chandigarh*, panchkula, *nanocity* in barwala/raipur, *...* www.gurgaonscoop.com/story/2007/4/23/2736/63722 - 58k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this Nano City hots up realty pricesWith *Sabeer Bhatia*-promoted Nano City proposed at the sleepy township of Raipur Rani *...* Talking to Newsline, Naval *Bhatia*, Director, *Nanocity*.in Developers *...* cities.expressindia.com/fullstory.php?newsid=246070 - 41k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this Nano City 12), *Sabeer Bhatia*plans Nano city for Haryana by Charanjit Ahuja, *Chandigarh* The Financial Express (05/04/2006). 13), *Bhatia* in Nano City, full steam for *...* www.*nanocity*.com/press-links.html - 17k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this The Hindu : Other States / Haryana News : Nano City to come upIt will be better then the Silicon Valley, says *Sabeer Bhatia* *...* Mr. Hooda said that a special purpose vehicle called *nanocity*.in would be formed by the *...* www.hindu.com/2006/09/01/stories/2006090104860500.htm - 19k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this The Hindu : Other States / Haryana News : Deal inked for knowledge *...* *CHANDIGARH*: The Haryana State Industrial and Infrastructure Development Corporation *...* *Sabeer Bhatia* of Hotmail fame, in the presence of Haryana Financial *...* www.hindu.com/2006/11/02/stories/2006110206650500.htm - 18k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this CRGP News *...* *Chandigarh* and Sahara's Aamby Valley (Lonavala) in India. It further investigates the upcoming urban developments like *Sabeer Bhatia's Nanocity* *...* crgp.stanford.edu/news/atom.xml - 49k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this Date:01/09/2006 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2006/09/01/stories *...*It will be better then the Silicon Valley, says *Sabeer Bhatia* *...* Hooda said that a special purpose vehicle called *nanocity*.in would be formed by the HSIIDC *...* www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/thscrip/print.pl?file=2006090104860500.htm&date=2006/09/01/&prd=th&- 7k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this *Chandigarh*, Panchkula & Mohali and sorroundings [Archive *...*I also belong to *chandigarh*, we should see the interest level and think about doing something *.....* *Nanocity* (*Sabeer Bhatia*): Big plans for PKL. *...* www.r2iclubforums.com/clubvb/archive/index.php/t-601.html - 52k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this Nanobiotechnology in India : Nanobiotech Activity in India (Aug *...*Venture Activity July 18 2006, Gurgaon: *Sabeer Bhatia* of 'Hotmail ' fame is investing $10 Billion into the setting up of a' *NanoCity*' *...* nanobioindia.sulekha.com/blog/post/2006/08/nanobiotech-activity-in-india-aug-2006.htm- 48k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this did you know hotmail is by an indian - Uyirvani Forum AR rahman *...* *Sabeer Bhatia* founded Hotmail Biography *Sabeer* was born in *Chandigarh*, India, *...* is to build a new city in India called Nano city at www.* nanocity*.in. *...* www.uyirvani.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=16127&mode=threaded&pid=687271 - 85k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this Gurgaon Community Portal || News, Views, Reviews, Comments *...* *Sabeer Bhatia* is planning *nanocity* in Pkl. 2.) Panchkula tech park is upcoming new project. 3.) Even *Chandigarh* IT park which is developing very fast, *...* www.gurgaonscoop.com/story/2007/4/24/234546/346 - 60k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this قصة مخترع الهوت ميل - Future Movement - Almustaqbal- [ Translate this page] *Sabeer* was born in *Chandigarh*, India in 1969 to typical middle class parents. His father, Balev *Bhatia*, worked in the Indian Ministry of Defence while his *...* www.futuremovement.org/forum/showthread.php?t=17312 - 91k - Cached- Similar pages- Note this On 8/29/07, Priya Sen wrote: > > Dear All, > > This is my first posting on the list but I wanted to write in and see > what you all know about Nanocity, a proposed 11,000 "metropolis" being > built 20km or so outside Chandigarh by Sabeer Bhatia, the Hotmail > millionairre. I'm a student at UC berkeley here in the US in the urban > planning > program, and people here are involved in the design of this city, > which seems to have land clearance from the governent and is claiming > to be ready by 2012 at the cost of over $1bn. > > Now, in India and the Indian press, I haven't seen much or any public > dialogue about this - -for a project of this magnitude it strikes me as > odd because it seems to be going much beyond the IT park/SEZ/Township > models that we're used to, and I'm wondering why there is such silence > about it. > > There must be issues of diplacement of people and land use involved, > without even talking about what it means for a private millionairre to > decide > to build a "21st century metropolis." > > Can anyone enlighten? If everyone else is as much out of the loop as I > have been, I think its time we start taking Mr Bhatia's plan seriously and > trying to understand what's apparently going on in our backyard. > > best, > Gautam > _______________________________________________ > Urbanstudygroup mailing list > Urban Study Group: Reading the South Asian City > > To subscribe or browse the Urban Study Group archives, please visit > https://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/urbanstudygroup > -- ================================================== Please avoid sending me Word or PowerPoint attachments. See http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/no-word-attachments.html ================================================== Chandra Nath, 01edge technologies, 6830 Woodley Ave #4, Van Nuys, CA 91406, USA http://01edge.com/ Phone: 310 882 1945 email: nath at computer.org _______________________________ IMPORTANT NOTICE: This email message including any attachments is legally privileged, confidential and is for the use of the individual or entity to whom it is addressed. Any unauthorized review, use, disclosure or distribution is expressly prohibited. If you have received this email message in error, please immediately notify us by email and destroy all copies of the message. Thank you. -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://mail.sarai.net/pipermail/urbanstudygroup/attachments/20070831/0c7d9df7/attachment-0002.html