Articles
Demonstrating social value is the real impact for any government that claims expenditure on 'national interest', claimed J C Kumarappa in his thesis on Public Finance while in Columbian University in the 1920s. Moving forward he claimed that the touchstone of prosperity of the general mass of public rather than profitability or efficiency of public administration.
Today 'national interest' is used as a blanket activity which is not open to public interrogation. National interest as a public discourse is often subsumed under the vague shifting goalpost herd…
I was yet again asked by a caring parent to advise their child on choosing the higher education that is aligned with a rightful career. While I do talk to the youth time and again like this, this made me reflect on what I really would like to suggest. As this is the day of pursuit of knowledge traditionally, I decided to put down my thoughts as an article.
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What are the skills, knowledge, and perspectives that youth today need to have to ensure their survival? What do they need to know to sustain not just themselves, but, also the planet. We know that the consumerist…
It was in 2019 when I was invited to give a talk in the NEXUS Latin American Global Conference in Quito, Equador that I first started to think and articulate the need for a global platform for Indigenous Entrepreneurs. Social Entrepreneurs have their task cut-out with several challenges such as the prevailing political economy, deep seated cultural and societal misgivings, modern market organization and lack of adequately oriented manpower that can align its aspirations to the sector and ones' own personal challenges. The circus of Social Entrepreneurship that has defined the contours of the…
Academic Elites and their Climate Indifference…
Unforgivable sloth of Indian academia towards impact of Climate Change on rural India and its practices that could contribute towards the knowledge to save the planet…
How many academics in India are working on Climate Change (CC) and its impact? – there is no single repository of such institutions or their studies in the Indian context. If the IPCC projects were to come true, what will be the impact on the food security of Indians by 2030? Do we have mitigation and adaptation techniques for every zone? What is our knowledge pathway…
What Sustains the Ordinary People of India?
What would Dharampal say?
“I don’t understand what you mean by Sustainability. To me a hundred families agreeing to live together in a village, with an understanding of the divine nature of their interdependency and that of the dependency on others is a sustainable society” – a village elder in Virudhunagar
“This large tree we are sitting under, it is the rosewood tree. Often visitors who come to village look at it and talk about its commercial value, for me, it is not just timer, it a tree I grew up with, I relate to. If we were to only think…
This article was published in the Centenary Publication of collected articles on Dharampal and his works by PPST and Other India Books, Goa called Re-Imagining Swaraj through Indian Tradition. Having worked with Dharampal the Gandhian Historian between 2000 and his demise in 2006, Rama and Ramasubramanian, the founders of Samanvaya jointly have written this article based on one of the 20 archival compilations that they assisted Dharampal with. The book maybe purchased from the online book shop of OIB publications here
Revisiting Dharampal’s Archival Compilation on the…
This article was written for Teacher Plus magazine December 2022 special issue on Climate Change. The magazine maybe accessed here.
Naming the elephant in the room or even parts of it
Climate change teaching in practice
Climate change response is deliberately defined as a phenomenon of global magnitude in which the small individual acts don’t really add up to anything significant. Similarly, teaching climate change and sensitizing the next generation is made into a theoretical lesson that cannot hold their attention for long. In this article I will try to provide practical exercises…
Rev. Sara Joleno Wolcott and Ramasubramanian have been working together since 2014 when they first met in Chennai during the former's work and travels in India. Rev. Sara started the Sequoia Samanvaya in the US in 2018 and since then they have jointly toured and lectures and facilitated change processes together in Germany, USA, Canada and Ecuador. In January 2021, Sequoia Samanvaya brought out its first online journal the Grove and as part of it, the following conversational essay was jointly published by both of them. The complete version with several visuals is…
(The Federal is a news portal I didn't know existed till they called me a couple of weeks ago and asked to write on this subject. Sharing this article that went online today. The article is available online here. )
Writing about Gandhian ethics in the time of the pandemic can be both problematic and irrelevant. Irrelevant, because Gandhiji himself may not have been “writing” on anything, and problematic because it will not adhere to the regulatory needs of only saying positive things. So, I have restored to fiction here. A telephonic interview with Bapu by a young podcaster.
“So…
In 2019, the Journal of Rural Development brought out by the National Institute of Rural Development and Panchayati Raj, under the Ministry of Rural Development, Government of India brought out a special edition to celebrate the 150th Birth Year of Mahatma Gandhi. It requested Ramasubramanian to be the Special Thematic Editor for the Journal that contained 10 articles from eminent authors from different parts of world. This was released on the 2nd October 2019 by NIRD. The following is the Foreword written exclusively for that Journal.
Foreword
Isha Vasyam idam…