Change the Conversation

    In a way, Mahatma Gandhi conceptualized smart villages. A champion of participatory democracy and grassroots development, he believed that making villages self-contained and sustainable was the first step towards empowering India. Contrary to popular belief, he wasn’t against industrialisation, markets and competition as long as they did not lead to the passive or active exploitation of villagers. Yet, seven decades after independence, we are nowhere close to realizing Gandhi’s vision of empowered villages. Rural India remains in a deplorable state. One reason for this is institutional neglect. Headquarters of malnourishment A glaring example is Harisal, a small village in Amravati district in the western Indian state of Maharashtra. During my first fieldwork in this village, I learned that telephone lines and mobiles didn’t work here, infant mortality rates were alarmingly high, finding meaningful employment was impossible, school dropouts were the norm, and avenues for learning skills non-existent. In fact, soon after taking charge in October 2014, chief minister Devendra Fadnavis even referred to Harisal as the “headquarters of malnourishment”. Harisal was far from being one of the Narendra Modi-led central government’s smart villages. Being a passionate skeptic of blanket monolithic solutions, my vision for smart villages is for them to emerge as a cluster of connected communities, each having a distinct sense of style, purpose and being. For me, Harisal will be smart when a handloom weaver near the Melghat Tiger Reserve begins her day by powering her mobile internet through “White-Fi” (technology that leverages unutilized spectrum owned by television channels to provide low-cost internet connectivity), discovers business opportunities using a customer relationship management app, and partners with payment gateways, e-commerce firms, and rural transport services to provide finished garments from Mumbai to Jammu. So, over the past year, the Maharashtra government and Microsoft have collaborated to develop […]

www.themirrorinspires.com Most books report on what has already happened. John O’Brien has written one that describes the future. But it’s not just built on his ideas. Visions 2100: Stories from Your Future presents scenarios from 80 of the world’s leading environmental thinkers and influencers. 1. Robogardeners, LaserBubbles and Parceldrones are things Like most people, my family and I grow lots of our own food. (Ok, Robogardeners do most of the work. But we tell them what we’d like). We eat real meat occasionally, and Newmeat more regularly. The kids like Newmeat better but they don’t really have adult palettes yet. We travel by bike. We all have Copenhagen Wheels for the hills and I love our LaserBubbles that protect us in the rain. We live just a few kilometres from work and school. Parceldrones carry the big things for us when we go shopping. 2. There’s an app to share human poo Every resource – even human waste – is used to its highest capacity via ‘Need and Want’ sharing apps. All of our stuff is designed to neatly turn into other stuff – or fuel. We dress in virtual, chameleon-like clothing for our virtual adventures to make holographic videos to show our virtual friends. We are free to live vibrantly without being overwhelmed. 3. The elderly don’t live alone Elder lifecare re-integrated into AllAge areas is massive now. Add all the required cooling, catering, shared resource-cycling has changed so much of our lifestyle, architecture and spatial planning. Then the on and offshore arcology, plans advanced for Moon and Mars and already on Antarctica. So, we see it works when it makes sense for economy, society and ecology. 4. Women take charge Did having an all-female G7 Summit ten years earlier have anything to do with the smoothness of the […]