Yantrakaal

image from MIT Review When resources are limited it is creativity and its first cousin, innovation, that allows us to get ahead by achieving more with less. In practical terms it translates into the importance of R&D in corporates, or its precursor, research in academia. Which is why publish or perish has been the guiding mantra for those seeking tenure -- or permanent employment -- in US academic institutions. Since the US is the fountainhead of the most innovative ideas in STEM and related disciplines there must be a positive correlation between innovation and publications. This is the logic used in China where it is mandatory for all academicians to be prolific in publishing papers. This policy has resulted in interesting developments. First, China -- and Chinese researchers embedded in US academia --  lead the world in terms of the sheer number of papers published. Second, a large number of these papers have been found to be of poor quality if not actually fraudulent. ...

Time for India to lead the world with thorium power plants Global warming is a source of concern because it is believed to be leading to drastic changes in weather patterns.  This could cause serious damage to both the economy and the ecosystem. The burning of carbonaceous fossil fuels, coal and oil, are said to be the most important cause for global warming because they lead to the discharge of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere and this in turn traps solar heat through the greenhouse effect. Hence many activists have argued against the usage of coal and oil, in thermal power plants and internal combustion engines, and demand conversion to electric power. But while the usage of electric power is certainly clean, electricity itself needs to be generated somehow -- it just cannot appear by magic in those two or three holes in the wall. Two clean sources of electricity are solar and wind and activists have long argued that these should be the basis of electricity generation in...

All discussions on nuclear energy revolve around uranium and plutonium, the stuff with which we can make atom bombs. But not too many outside atomic energy circles would have heard about their close cousin, thorium, which is another natural element that can be used like uranium to generate nuclear energy. In this article, we explore how Thorium can be a cleaner, safer and more abundant alternative. image from  http://gppreview.com/2014/11/06/nuclear-options-explains-u-s-china-cooperation-thorium/ Elements, like hydrogen (H), helium (He), carbon (C), oxygen (O) all the way to uranium (U) that are found in the Earth’s crust are defined in terms of the number of protons in the nucleus (the atomic number) and the number of protons+neutrons (the atomic weight). Chemical properties are determined by the atomic number and elements that share the same atomic number but have different atomic weights are called isotopes of each other. Thus the common Carbon 12 and the relatively rare...

This beautiful terracotta temple lies unknown and uncared for in the village of Sonamukhi, Bankura, West Bengal. If you are in the vicinity, you can check it out

Physics, Economics, Cybernetics, Aesthetics … and now Digitalics. What is digitalics? Just as the  zeitgeist -- the spirit of the times -- captures the changing mood as we move along the arrow of time, digitalics represents the current state of the weltgeist -- the spirit of a new hyper digital world where we find ourselves today. This digital world is the new, happening place that none of us can, or even wish to, escape from in our personal, social and professional lives. Whether it is checking your WhatsApp or Facebook timeline, moving money on NEFT, marketing products on social media, hiring on Linkedin, listening to the voice of the customer on Twitter or cutting e-Waybills for your trucks that move across state borders --  everything happens in the digital world. Or rather where the digital touches the physical in the tangled web of click-and-mortar. That is digitalics at work. Digitalics is different from computer programming, computer science and even from...

How to create a three dimensional framework consisting of a rugged digital marketplace, corporatised vendors and trained managers that will catapult the Indian economy into the big league. image credit clrskills Handicraft Fairs -- or HastaShilpa Melas -- are a regular feature in Kolkata, where artisans from the rural areas come, show and sell their products. The Micro Small Medium Enterprises (MSME) Department of the West Bengal Government has, through the Biswa Bangla initiative, set up a number of permanent, fairly upscale retail outlets to help these people sell their products. Some of these outlets are probably profitable, as is the one in Kolkata Airport, but a majority of them, in district towns and elsewhere, suffer from a lack of footfalls or well heeled buyers. Frankly, this is old wine in new bottles. We have had in the past, Khadi & Gramodyog initiatives under various names in different states, as in Manjusha (West Bengal), Poompuhar (Tamil Nadu), Kairali (Keral...

Truth is out there, but unreachable What is the rate of growth of India’s GDP? Some people will say it is close to 7% while others will claim that it is 4.5% with a 95% confidence interval of 3.5 - 5.5. Some will say that it depends on the base year that is chosen. A common man like me with no access to “real” data, whatever or wherever it may be, will have to believe someone or the other. Picture credit NYTimes How many people were killed in the recent communal conflagration at Sandeshkhali, on the Bangladesh border? Some newspaper reports say 7 or even more, while the others quote the police and say 4. Who were killed? The BJP says that its supporters were murdered by Rohingya intruders while the Trinamul claims that their supporters were killed by Bihari goons. Sitting in Calcutta, or reading this somewhere in India, one would never know what is the truth. You would have to believe someone whom you trust. But can you ever know whom to really trust? Most of us know that ...