Developing country governments often launch new agricultural programmes without collecting pre-implementation survey data, making it difficult to evaluate the effects of such programmes. Leveraging the flexibility of granular pixel-level satellite panel data and a well-developed quasi-experimental policy evaluation design, we study a programme where pre-implementation data is unavailable. We estimate the effect of cash transfers on agricultural productivity in Telangana, India. Treatment and control regions are within 10 km on either side of the state border. They are identical in all respects except for the difference in exposure to policy treatment. Agricultural productivity increased in the major monsoon cropping season due to the cash transfer programme. The findings also reveal that cash transfers helped reduce productivity gaps between irrigated and rainfed agricultural areas. Our results are robust to two different sources of satellite data, three alternative indicators of productivity, two rounds of full-scale resampling, 100 rounds of small-scale resampling and three alternative border designs. Placebo regressions of two previous years also confirm our results. This approach to policy evaluation is applicable anywhere satellite data are available in the world.

Authors: Muddasir Ahmad Akhoon, Abhishek Shaw, Vidya Vemireddy

In this paper, the researchers revisit the relevance of the agrarian question of capital and provide evidence of the dynamism in agriculture based on an empirical enquiry. They study the possibilities, channels and patterns of agrarian accumulation and its spillover on the nonagrarian accumulation dynamics in an agriculturally advanced region lying in central India. Based on this empirical study, they posit that the agrarian question of capital remains important at a regional scale in India. By bringing the focus back on the question of capital, the paper maps the contemporary agrarian change processes as being linked to the process of generation of agrarian surplus and contributes to the debate on the relevance of the agrarian question of capital in the Global South.

Authors: Sunit Arora, Deepak K Mishra

Biological invasions pose substantial economic threats globally, yet detailed cost assessments for many Global South nations, especially in Africa, remain scarce. This study presents the first comprehensive breakdown of the potential economic costs of biological invasions in Morocco. The researchers identified 343 invasive alien species, comprising approximately 1.11 percent of the country’s biodiversity. Using the InvaCost database, they retrieved cost estimates for 137 species with available records. They calculated the mean annual cost per species, adjusted these values both socio-economically (using World Bank Purchasing Power Parity) and climatically (via Köppen climatic regions), and extrapolated them based on species prevalence in Morocco. This yielded an estimated annual economic impact ranging from USD 1.14 billion (conservative adjusted value) to USD 5.13 billion (maximum scenario). Across all estimations, damage costs consistently exceeded management costs by one or two orders of magnitude. Despite challenges in extrapolating cost data from other regions, this study underscores the urgent need for more research and for targeted management and policy interventions to minimise the spread of invasive species and reduce their economic toll. Proactive measures in Morocco, coupled with international collaboration, will be critical to mitigating this socio-ecological crisis and ensuring long-term sustainability.

Authors: Jazila El Jamaai, Ahmed Taheri, Liliana Ballesteros-Mejia, Danish A. Ahmed, Alok Bang, Christophe Diagne, Franck Courchamp and Elena Angulo 

Authors:

Pebsworth, P. A., Dore, K. M., Hansen, M., Anand, S., & Zinner, D.

Urban blue spaces, such as lakes and rivers, are increasingly recognised for their ecological and social roles, yet their contributions to sustainable food systems remain understudied. Here, the researchers examine the extent and benefits of foraging in urban blue spaces across four major Indian cities through a survey of 1,200 users. We identify three forager groups, that is, ​‘rare’, ​‘occasional’ and ​‘frequent’ foragers, whose behaviours differ in frequency and practice. Women, the elderly and marginalised communities most frequently collect, share, cook and sell edibles. Access to home or community gardens strongly motivates occasional foragers. Frequent foragers emphasise benefits relating to nutrition and income, as well as culture and social capital, whereas occasional foragers appreciate nature- and culture-related benefits. The findings challenge conventional perspectives on urban food provisioning, highlighting urban blue spaces as vital yet overlooked spaces for food access and resilience. Integrating foraging into urban planning can enhance equitable food systems, fostering transformative change toward sustainable urban landscapes.

Authors: Sukanya Basu, Brenda Maria Zoderer, Harini Nagendra, Peter H Verburg, Tobias Plieninger 

The need to strengthen comprehensive primary health care towards ensuring ​“Health for All” is well established yet operationalising this has remained a challenge globally as well as in India. Based on a qualitative study of a collaborative initiative between the government and a civil society organisation, this article discusses what factors and processes explain successful implementation of primary health care in a remote rural area in central India.

Authors: Arima Mishra, Raman Kataria, Roseline Sagar, Pawan Singh, Pankaj Tiwari, Shivkant Tripathi, Vinay Vishwakarma, Sapna Mishra

The increasing global demand for food, coupled with the impacts of climate change and environmental degradation, has shifted attention towards blue food systems. While these systems offer a potential solution to food security challenges, their sustainability is threatened by various factors, including overfishing, habitat destruction, and climate change. Recognising these challenges, the Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO, UN) advocates for ensuring the sustainable contribution of aquatic food systems to global food security and nutrition, aligning with the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals (UN-SDGs). It was hypothesised that adoption of UN-SDGs would increase the interest of researchers in sustainability of fisheries and aquaculture. Therefore, a bibliometric analysis of the relevant literature published between 2000 and 2023 was conducted to test this hypothesis. The analysis revealed a significant rise in publications addressing climate change and sustainability after the adoption of the UN-SDGs. The countries exhibiting high vulnerability to climate change contributed disproportionately fewer publications to the database. The United States emerged as the leading contributor in terms of publication volume, while Canada’s University of British Columbia was identified as the institution with the highest number of contributing authors. The findings underscore pronounced geographical disparities in research output, with a predominance of countries from the Global North. The underlying factors contributing to these disparities are discussed. Furthermore, the study discusses the policy implications of these findings and emphasises the imperative to prioritise equitable research initiatives. Such efforts are essential to effectively support the realisation of the SDGs within the domain of blue food systems and sustainability.

The Indian economy, despite registering high growth, is characterised by a persistent and vast informal economy. Using it as an illustration, the researchers draw lessons for characterising labour markets in contexts of high informality. They employ a group-based statistical modelling method to identify whether there exist systematic patterns in the high volume of worker transitions across different employment arrangements. Using panel data for eight points between 2017 and 2019, they identify seven dominant labour market trajectories. The trajectory capturing stable formal salaried employment, with highest average earnings, accounts for only 6.7% of the sample. None of the dominant trajectories denote a job ladder from informal to formal work, and the sorting of individuals into informal trajectories is far from voluntary, indicating an existence of formal and informal segmentation. The most populous trajectory, comprising 38.4% of the sample, with second highest average income (although half of that of the formal salaried trajectory), is stable self-employment, followed by the trajectory representing transition within different forms of informal wage work at 27.2%. Most trajectory groups associated with informal wage arrangements have high flux, indicating lack of stability. Furthermore, trajectories associated with informal wage employment have even lower earnings than those with informal self-employment. Far from suggesting a desirability of informal self-employment, this is indicative of a breaking down of the expected voluntary transition from self to wage employment in the transformation process. Additionally, access to trajectories is stratified along various correlates, especially caste. Caste hierarchy operates most starkly at the node of accessing the trajectories, while in terms of penalties or gains in earnings, traditional caste-hierarchy may not always operate uniformly. The findings disrupt the standard expectation in structural transformation models and labour market theories, while highlighting the need to foreground evolving nature of informality in labour market models for developing economies.

Authors: Rosa Abraham, Surbhi Kesar

This article presents a historical account of emergence and development of the territorial power of Jats in Punjab through analysing three elements. First, their historical appropriation of the village as their agrarian territory, which was often perpetuated under the discourse of ​‘village community’/clans and the monopolisation of the peasant identity. Second, the often-benevolent administration in Punjab during the colonial rule. Third, the development of a discourse of caste-progressiveness of Jats. The Punjab experience in this regard is significant to understand similar processes in other states and to make appropriate strategies for social movements and policy advocacy regarding agrarian/​social reforms.

Résumé

Cet article présente un compte rendu historique de l’émergence et du développement du pouvoir territorial des Jats au Pendjab en analysant trois éléments. Premièrement, leur appropriation historique du village en tant que territoire agraire, qui s’est souvent perpétuée sous le discours de la « communauté villageoise »/​clans et de la monopolisation de l’identité paysanne. Deuxièmement, l’administration souvent bénévole du Pendjab pendant la période coloniale. Troisièmement, le développement d’un discours sur la progressivité de la caste des Jats. L’expérience du Pendjab à cet égard est importante pour comprendre des processus similaires dans les autres États et pour élaborer des stratégies appropriées pour les mouvements sociaux et le plaidoyer politique concernant les réformes agraires/​sociales.

Reflecting a longstanding intellectual heritage in Marxist political economy, contributions to agrarian studies have variously referred to the production, distribution and extraction of value. Despite this central role within the heritage of agrarian studies, the concept of value is often used inconsistently between authors and sometimes deployed without clear elucidation of the underlying theoretical tenets. As such, value often tends to be used more as a metaphor suggestive of conditions of exploitation rather than a detailed conceptual framework. In response, we must ask if there is still a robust case for value analysis forming a foundational pillar of agrarian studies? To address this challenging question, we invited three authors to give their perspective on the value of value for agrarian studies. First and foremost, we asked them to consider what value analysis does that is otherwise missed in critical agrarian studies and how we can mobilise its potential to sharpen analyses. Two further pivotal questions arise, spurred on by recent trends in the literature. First, to what extent do the categories of value enrich or hinder our evolving understanding of the dynamics of social reproduction within agrarian households and communities, including the gendered relations through which agriculture and livelihoods are performed? Similarly, are the largely anthropogenic concepts of value fit for the purpose of explaining environmental change and the more-than-human dynamics through which agricultural landscapes are produced and change over time?

Authors: A Haroon Akram-Lodhi, Srishti Yadav, Alessandra Mezzadri, Marcus Taylor

This article aims to understand the methodological position that Marx takes in Capital Volume 1 and the implications of that on the individual units in his analysis. With the understanding that Marx adopts a fundamentally holist methodological standpoint, the article outlines how the individuals within classes and the system of capitalist production are measured and contextualised. This question is answered by examining Marx’s Capital Volume 1 as the primary text. Where relevant, the author engages with Marx’s intellectual background and tradition. The individual units discussed in this study are the commodity, the worker and the capitalist.

This article examines how the concept of the representative individual emerges through averaging and how this process unfolds in Marx’s Capital, shaped by his methodological approach. The article illustrates the method of averaging in Marx, through his intellectual engagement with Quetelet as it also focusses on Hegel’s influence on Marx’s method and elaborates on the parallels and divergences between them. With the given engagement with Capital and Marx’s intellectual interactions, we arrive at a specific understanding of holism that can be attributed to Marx in Capital Volume 1.

Author: Sushmita Rama Subrahmanyam

This article aims to understand the methodological position that Marx takes in Capital Volume 1 and the implications of that on the individual units in his analysis. With the understanding that Marx adopts a fundamentally holist methodological standpoint, the article outlines how the individuals within classes and the system of capitalist production are measured and contextualised. This question is answered by examining Marx’s Capital Volume 1 as the primary text. Where relevant, the researcher engages with Marx’s intellectual background and tradition. The individual units discussed in this study are the commodity, the worker and the capitalist.

This article examines how the concept of the representative individual emerges through averaging and how this process unfolds in Marx’s Capital, shaped by his methodological approach. The article illustrates the method of averaging in Marx, through his intellectual engagement with Quetelet as it also focuses on Hegel’s influence on Marx’s method and elaborates on the parallels and divergences between them. With the given engagement with Capital and Marx’s intellectual interactions, the researcher arrives at a specific understanding of holism that can be attributed to Marx in Capital Volume 1.

Author: Sushmita Rama Subrahmanyam, Student, MA in Economics (2024−2026)

“Global learning crisis” narratives, in focusing on the ​“proximate determinants” of the crisis, represent a welcome ​“classroom turn” in international education and development. Extant learning crisis literatures are problematic, however, as their homogenizing gaze distorts how teachers and students co-constitute classrooms as locally meaningful learning spaces. Drawing on anthropological approaches in comparative education, this article addresses the ​“learning crisis” in a middle-school classroom in a weavers’ neighborhood in Kanchipuram. Constituted in an elaborate ​“notebook economy,” this classroom was an inventive response that not only accommodated students’ material cultures and social-educational disadvantages but also affected their belonging in a resource-scarce public education system. If the learning it afforded was disdained in ​“learning crisis” narratives, it was nevertheless relevant for students, readily translated into educationally unintensive assembly-line jobs. In producing contempt for such classrooms, ​“learning crisis” narratives merely distract from — and thus entrench — the deeply unequal economic and educational development that necessitated the notebook economy in the first place.

The COVID-19 crisis created a period when an otherwise globalised world witnessed the rapid closure of local, national and international borders. Migrants, whose everyday lives, with or without the pandemic, are disrupted and defined by borders and their liminalities, were the most certain victims of these closures. All media platforms around the world reported on migrant workers, either villainising them as carriers of the virus or sympathising with them as victims of continued racist assaults and ruthless state policies. But what discourses dominated these media representations of migrants? Analysing over one thousand news reports on migrant precarity in India and the USA during the first two years of COVID, we see some patterns of gendered inclusion and exclusion. We find that even the seemingly pro-immigrant media discourses continued to emphasise migrants’ vulnerability, turning them into feminised props for larger political debates. In the process, the economic contributions of migrants across skill categories and often as ​‘essential workers’ remained invisible. The discourses also reproduced intersectional stereotypes, sometimes completely removing women, and often selectively magnifying or erasing their racial, ethnic and caste identities.

Authors:

Bandana Purkayastha, Rianka Roy, S. Anandhi, Deepa Ebenezer

This article offers an introduction to Marxian economics for the uninitiated student or instructor. It first places Marxian economics within the surplus approach and ties Marx’s economic analysis with his theory of history, that is, historical materialism. The concepts of class, mode of production and antagonism are introduced. The article then discusses Marx’s analysis of capitalism. This is performed by first introducing the reader to the labour theory of value and then to the circuit of capital. The conflict between capital and labour and the conflict between capital and capital are explored around the question of technological change and innovation. This is followed by a brief discussion of the capitalist crises in the Marxian framework, after which the article concludes by presenting two strands of debate within Marxian economics.

Understanding users’ perception of natural areas and their ecosystem services is crucial for managers and policy makers as it directly informs decisions that balance conservation efforts with public acceptance. The alpine areas are particularly vulnerable to climate change, making it critical to understand how visitors perceive these areas to develop management strategies that minimize conflicts, helping to ensure long-term support for environmental protection. This study explores the perceptions of 21 ecosystem services – including cultural, regulating and provisioning services – among visitors of two protected alpine areas in Italy. We distributed 3,399 questionnaires to evaluate visitors’ perceptions of the importance of key ecosystem services, their awareness of the ecosystem services concept and any shifts in perception due to COVID-19, as the study took place during an ease of restrictions caused by the pandemic. Additionally, we explored the relationship between perceptions and demographic factors. Results showed that visitor strongly perceived the importance of the aesthetic value of the landscape and biodiversity conservation. Perception of the overall importance of ES was strongly correlated with demographic factors, such as gender, age and a connection to outdoor and naturalistic activities. Visitors who were already aware of the ES concepts exhibited higher perceptions compared to those who did not acknowledge them, suggesting the need for targeted communication strategies to extend the awareness of the ES concept. This data provides critical insights for managers and policymakers to tailor communication efforts, fostering greater public awareness and support for the benefits provided by protected natural areas.

Authors:

Noemi Rota, Claudia Canedoli, Oscar Luigi Azzimonti, Harini Nagendra & Emilio Padoa-Schioppa

The Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) is India’s rural employment guarantee programme that provides 100 days of work to each household and mandates payment of wages within 15 days of completion of work. MGNREGA has been subject to many technological interventions purported to improve efficiency and transparency. Many of these interventions were introduced without any consultation or scientific piloting resulting in violation of workers’ rights. We focus on two digital interventions. Firstly, in the financial year 2021 – 22, wage payments of workers were segregated based on their caste. Notwithstanding delays in wage payments, we find there is a statistically significant difference in the time taken to process payments across caste. This provides an empirical corroboration of how this move created caste tensions at worksites. Just in our sample, the compensation as per law that is payable to workers due to delays by the union government alone is ₹399 million. This is neither acknowledged nor paid. Secondly, we demonstrate that there is no statistically significant difference either in timely payment of wages or in payment rejections between the Aadhaar-Based Payment System (ABPS) and the standard account-based methods. Our analysis is based on 31.36 million transactions across 10 states from financial year 2021 – 22 crawled from the programme’s Management Information System. This is the first large-scale data-based evidence debunking officially stated claims of timely payments due to ABPS. We also examine official government circulars, documents retrieved using Right to Information responses combined with our immersive fieldwork to underscore our findings. In summary, we argue that any digital technology introduced in MGNREGA or any other social policy must be done through a consultative process, independent audits, giving centrality to workers’ rights.

Authors:

Suguna Bheemarasetti, Anuradha De, Rajendran Narayanan, Parul Saboo & Laavanya Tamang

Introducing foreign elements into a crystal lattice could trigger phase transformation, serving as an excellent means to fabricate highly electrocatalytic phases. NiCo2S4 is a notably electrocatalytic thiospinel phase, normally synthesized via two-step route and rarely explored for electrocatalytic hydrazine oxidation reaction (HzOR). This work reports one-step hydrothermal syntheses of NiCo2S4 and CuCo2S4 and their performance for HzOR and oxygen evolution reaction (OER). Time-dependent syntheses suggest formation of (M, Co)9S8; M=Ni/Cu phase, followed by conversion to the respective thiospinel phase. Computational study validates that the incorporation of Ni into Co9S8 disrupts its stability and induces the formation of a stable bi-metallic thiospinel phase. Even without the assistance of metal foam substrate, NiCo2S4 displayed remarkable activity for HzOR requiring potentials of 153 and 350 mV to afford current densities of 10 and 500 mA/​cm2, respectively. Furthermore, NiCo2S4 showed good activity for OER, providing 10 mA/​cm2 at 290 mV. For hydrazine-assisted H2 production, the two-electrode setup, NiCo2S4||Pt/C attained a current density of 10 mA/​cm2 at 140 mV, which is 1.39 V less than that required for conventional water electrolyzer (1.53 V). Long-term durability of NiCo2S4 for both HzOR and OER at high current densities highlights the suitability of the catalyst for practical applications.

Author/​s: Diya Raveendran, Viplove Mishra, Athma E. Praveen, Avishek Roy, Aditi Chandrasekar, Venkataramanan Mahalingam, Ananda Basak

Small-scale fisheries play an important economic, social and cultural role in coastal Karnataka even today despite being subjected to several natural and anthropogenic stressors for a long time. They are neglected or even outright discouraged in the state’s fisheries policymaking, and their contributions to the state’s fish supply and their role in livelihood creation do not receive the due recognition. This paper is premised on the recognition of emerging stressors that pose a threat to the viability of small-scale fisheries. The impacts of these stressors have implications not only for the environment but also for nutrition, particularly among vulnerable populations, and the overall socio-economic stability of coastal communities that rely on fishing as a livelihood. The goals of this paper are to provide a thorough review of literature around these stressors, and to describe how these are being played out in coastal Karnataka. Among these stressors, we delve in depth on the new Blue Economy policy of India since it is likely to have severe antagonistic effects in combination with other anthropogenic stressors. Our opinion is, Karnataka has already started witnessing many of these ramifications of interventions/​stressors and the coastal landscape of the state is set to be transformed over the next couple of decades or so. Small-scale fisheries of the state are likely to be some of the most impacted communities from these interventions.

Authors:  Shruthi Suripeddi, Prasanna Surathkal, Amalendu Jyotishi, and Ramachandra Bhatta

Energy poverty related to a reliance on traditional biomass for cooking has a strong association with environmental degradation, gender inequity and human health. Reduction of energy poverty is a growing concern in public policy agenda globally. In India, the last decade has seen concerted efforts to provide clean cooking fuel to the population. Despite this, wide regional disparities in energy poverty exist in India, indicating differential regional impacts of policies. A shift to universal access to clean modern cooking fuel requires the redesign of policies, with insights from a decentralized understanding of actual drivers of household cooking energy choices across diverse regions. The paper attempts to explain household cooking fuel choices under multiple fuel use (fuel stacking) scenarios in two states of India, differentiated by their socio-economic status and development trajectories. The paper employs multinomial logistic (MNL) regression on household level data from the Indian Human Development Survey 2015 to identify factors determining fuel choices. Urbanization, per capita income, the educational attainment of the household head and women in the household, having a separate kitchen for cooking and not living in one’s own house were observed to be positively influencing a switch to clean cooking energy in both the states. The results of the study indicate that shifting out of energy poverty and achieving the goal of universal clean cooking energy would require combining ongoing welfare policies with policies on provisioning clean cooking energy in India.

Authors:  M Manjula

Science education literature states that fostering students’ and teachers’ knowledge of NOS has shifted from being a desirable goal to an essential one. This article focuses on the development of NOS conceptions among MA Education students. To develop those conceptions, the researcher designed various learning activities in the context of ​‘research of history on DNA’. Seven students were observed and audiotaped while working in groups in this classroom qualitative study. Before the intervention, pre-test on ​‘views on science’- Chen (2006) and group discussions held with participants indicated that their NOS conceptions were basic. After 7 sessions, a post-test was administered to students asking to justify NOS conceptions. These conceptions: scientifc knowledge is tentative, laws are generalisations or universal relationships, theories are inferred explanations of nature; and that science is empirically based, socio-culturally embedded, and creative. Classroom discourses and responses to a post-test indicated that participants justifed some NOS conceptions very well and some not so very well. It also argues that HOS ofers potential for improved learning of NOS.

The Rushikulya beach in eastern India is considered to be an important rookery (nesting site) for a species of migratory marine turtle, the olive ridleys Lepidochelys olivacea, because it is one of a handful of sites around the world where an arribada or mass-nesting event occurs. During an arribada, thousands of ridleys nest simultaneously over a small section of the beach, and several weeks later, millions of hatchlings emerge from these nests and crawl into the sea. Given the uniqueness of this phenomenon, conservation programmes have emphasised the monitoring and protection of ridleys during an arribada. In Rushikulya, this involves an assemblage of multiple actors, including biologists, their local assistants, and staff of the Odisha Forest Department. In this article, I use the concept of ontological choreography, drawn from multispecies scholarship, to focus attention on how members of this assemblage bring together different ontological orders, mainly nature and the individual self, to protect the ridleys. Further, I use this concept to direct attention to the hybrid nature of conservation practice — that it can simultaneously be affective, embodied, performative, sensory and technical. Overall, this article demonstrates how multispecies approaches can enrich social studies of conservation.

Authors:

Madhuri Ramesh

The present paper is a conceptual paper which explores the innate nature of languages exploring how they are in constant flux. From their sociological birth to them being politically accepted, languages go through a plethora of changes. This paper explores concepts like high and low varieties of language e.g., Hindi in playgrounds and Hindi used to teach; the concept of prestige associated with a language, as well as concepts like elaborate and restricted code by Basil Bernstein. It explores the creole continuum and how they are connected to language death. Diglossic conditions may also lead to languages being used over another leading to language disuse. Certain linguistic groups, despite having a working language, assimilate themselves with a larger language due to many possible reasons (economic, political, geographical or anything else). This paper will take the discussion forward with how policy decisions can also lead to systematic extinction of certain languages due to the farsightedness of language planning. Paulo Friere (Friere, 1985) spoke about how local languages can be the backbones of language education. This paper explores the inability of state level language planning policies at incorporating local languages into the curriculum leading to eventual endangerment of the language over generations. This paper will also look at languages with shared script and how it might be the result of language imperialism over centuries. The content and opinions expressed are that of the authors and are not necessarily endorsed by/​do not necessarily reflect the views of Azim Premji University.

The objective of this study was to assess the impact of short-term fasting and subsequent re-feeding cycles on compensatory growth performance, blood glucose levels, and digestive enzyme activity in mono-sex juvenile Nile tilapia (Oreochromis niloticus) over a 60-day period. A total of 150 juvenile Nile tilapia (Avg. wt. 9.34 ± 0.97 g) were allocated into five treatment groups: a control group (continuously fed) and four fasting groups — T1 (1‑day fasting), T2 (3‑day fasting), T3 (5‑day fasting), and T4 (7‑day fasting). Re-feeding occurred for 7 days in each group immediately following the fasting period in a recurring cycle. The average weight gain, specific growth rate, and feed efficiency ratio significantly (p < 0.05) declined starting from the T3 group. Blood glucose levels during fasting significantly decreased starting from the T2 group, but after re-feeding, they returned to levels comparable to the control group. The liver glycogen levels significantly (p ≤ 0.05) decreased during fasting and completely recovered upon re-feeding, while muscle glycogen levels did not show any significant (p ≤ 0.05) changes throughout the experimental duration. The activities of the digestive enzymes amylase and lipase significantly (p ≤ 0.05) decreased during fasting starting from T1 and T2 groups, respectively, but after re-feeding, they returned to the levels seen in the control group. In contrast, the protease enzyme levels during the fasting period initially increased up to the T2 group and subsequently returned to control levels in the T4 group. The findings of this study indicate that only the groups that experienced very short fasting periods, specifically up to the T2 group, attained body weights like the control group upon re-feeding due to compensatory growth. Therefore, this study concluded that implementing up to 3 days of fasting followed by 7 days of re-feeding in multiple cycles can serve as a strategy for minimizing input costs in tilapia farming.

There has been sustained debate for several decades, on the complex relationships between gender and science. Feminist scholars have critiqued the practices of science as being hegemonic. They trace the history of dominant practices to movements such as logical positivism. The justification for such a methodology drew from the premise that it led to the production of ​‘objective’ knowledge — true and free from human bias. However, a methodology that could be alienating for girls considering the traditional ways through which women have been socialised, could hinder the development of a ​‘science identity’. For girls who manage to continue with science in higher education, there are various other intangible barriers keeping them away from pursuing what seemed during their formative years as promising careers in science. This article presents an analysis of an assignment taken up by students in a Master’s in Education programme, as part of a course in Science Education. It required groups of students to interview a woman scientist in person and observe her working in the institution with which she is affiliated. The qualitative, thematic analysis presented multiple narratives reflecting on the role of support systems together with large challenges in overcoming perceived societal biases. However, the questions and possibilities raised by them present understanding and hope to young girls identifying with and hoping to pursue their interests in science.

The consolidation of agricultural lands by dominant socio-economic groups is discussed in the context of contemporary debate on the land question by foregrounding market-led land transfers as a driver of accumulation in rural India. Empirically rooted in central India, the paper studies the commodification and increasing concentration of land as an outcome of the processes of agrarian change at work. 

When NASA provided free worldwide access to the Landsat data archive, scientists greatly expanded the analysis of new locations and novel topics. Of course, data democracy is not just for scientists. When citizens own the rights to generate and access data that speaks to their concerns, democracy is strengthened. Data democracy began to gain prominence in the early 2000s, with the growth of the open data movement. In today’s era of climate change, the term assumes increasing significance. Yet despite the large volume of opensource climate data, access remains largely limited to academia and business. Climate data democracy enables all sections of society to access climate data; understand how to use and interpret it; and be able to use data for climate action. Given the lack of data and severity of the crisis in the Global South, we argue that these regions must take the lead in driving conversations around climate data democracy.

The principle of reasonable accommodation according to Article 2 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD) is defined as ​‘necessary and appropriate modification and adjustments not imposing a disproportionate or undue burden, where needed in a particular case, to ensure to persons with disabilities the enjoyment or exercise on an equal basis with others of all human rights and fundamental freedoms’. Exploring the relationship between inclusive policies enacted in institutions of higher education in India, and their impact on those who claim accommodation, we discuss the nature of care that informs and animates such interactions. Drawing on feminist disability studies scholarship on care, particularly, Akemi Nishida’s recommendation that care is inherently collective we analyse two sets of transactions selected for study as enabling care in patronising and charitable manners, while simultaneously ignoring the politics of responding to and providing accommodations. We find that institutional responses to accommodation claims are less reflective of the socio-political and affective aspects integral to the RA principle. Instead, the focus seems to be on providing either technocratic solutions or interpreting RA claims as causing undue burden. By reading the RA principle through the lens of scholarship on interdependence, we aim to broaden the scope of adopting and interpreting the RA principle.