Machine or Manual: Observations from Cotton Sowing

The ongoing sowing season has led to updating my priors about use of machine power on farms. It came about from our decision to grow cotton on three plots of four acres each. The following set of observations apply to small-scale farming (<5 hectares) only. This is not about cultivating at large scale. Instead of …

Who cares for MSP? A review of our winter growing season, 2022-23

December 2022 It started well. There were lovely views of farms with rows of fresh green saplings all through December and January. We sowed wheat on a 3.5 acre plot and gram (chickpea/chana) on 9 acres. From a cropping area of under 3.5 acres, 10 quintals of wheat was harvested. From a cropping area of …

On tilling vs no-tilling methods of farming – Evidence from research

Waterlogged farm from excessive rainfall. July, 2022 The long absence in writing about the farms has been on account of equipment breakdowns and a season of crop losses due to excessive rainfall in the district. In short, the kharif season of farming this year has been rife with difficulties and losses. But this post is …

Workers of the world can’t unite: May Day in neo-liberal times

Walking with workers on May Day morning was a humbling experience. Workers' unions from various establishments across the state showed up for May Day rally at the Town Hall yesterday. I was also filling up the last of my field trips for masters' thesis. So, this also comes from my field notes. The roads in …

First Learnings – Reading Margaret Mead

Anthropology from late 1940s to 1960s serves a useful starting point to understand how the growing breed of sociologists and anthropologists encountered experiences, people and cultures strikingly different from those which they came from. This could be true in any century, rather more so when the first Portuguese sailors arrived at the western coast of …

Anatomy of a Disaster: Cyclone Phailin

This month we are on an assignment which takes us to cyclone affected districts of Orissa. Reflecting on what we saw from our travel in the region in the aftermath of Cyclone Phailin (which struck India’s eastern coast on October 12, 2013) it appears that Odisha's preparedness and response to the disaster is an extraordinary example …

Alernative Dispute Resolution & Legal System Reform in India

This is the summer of dreaming dangerously (yes, Zizek too is in the summer reading list). I have been trying to pack in three different projects in this summer plus a travel in the subcontinent. Here goes a brief on the first internship at the Bangalore Mediation Center in Bangalore on mediation as a method …

Corporate – Community Relationship : An exploratory study

This summer, I finish another small study as a part of a research methods course. While findings are thin and not too reliable either, I have enjoyed every bit of it. For there are few opportunities when one can try out a variety of methods - qualitative, ethnographic, GIS based analysis, observations of various types …

On how not to do a study

It would be interesting to see the sort of writing that would come out if 'researchers' of Marxist influence were to leave their desks, go out into the real world (in quotes for I doubt if they should be called so) and do a study with actual field observations. I am making no criticism on …

A methodological note on field work & research

On conducting research in development sector and doing field work it appears that there are divergent views on how a question of interest (enquiry) should be pursued. These academic concerns - epistemological and ontological, were clearly unknown to us in our comapny where we have done contract research for small businesses, funding agencies and NGOs. …