Workshop on 'Water Resource Management: A Sociological Perspective'

     A Workshop was held on July 7, 2014, on 'Water Resource Management: A Sociological Perspective'. It was conducted by the Department of Sociology. It was conducted in the afternoon in room number 105 in Central Block, Christ University.

Soulful rendition of Pyaasi

      This Workshop covered of areas such as the Sociological Relevance of Water Resource Management, Case Studies on lake pollution in Bangalore, Water Privatisation, Water Literacy, Public Health Issues, and Water Politics. The workshop commenced with a rendition of Pyaasi, a song composed by Swarathma, a Bangalore based band. This was performed by Prof. Thomas Daniel and III Semester students of Applied Sociology.

       The Introductory session was on Water Resource Management by Prof. Thomas Daniel who is an Assistant Professor from South Asia Institute, Heidelberg University, Germany. He is currently visiting Christ University. He spoke about the philosophical perspective of water resource management in a Global and Indian context. In the Indian context he mentioned the importance of water in Arts, Literature and Mythology. Further he discussed water tanks and water resources in Bangalore from a macro perspective to micro perspective.

The second speaker, Soumya, spoke on ‘Lakes of Bangalore: Case studies of lake pollution’. She examined case studies of Ulsoor, Sarakki, Agara and Chunchagatta Lakes and spoke about water related movements. The next speaker Rinzing elaborated on Water Privatisation in India in general, and Bangalore in specific, along with the issues of extracting ground water and water tankers.  The fourth speaker, Deki, gave an outline about Water Literacy. She focused on water harvesting and recharging of the water table. Next, Margaret presented on Public Health and how we can manage water resources in a judicious way. Final presentation by Tanarupa was on Water Politics. In this topic she spoke about water disputes of India like the Kaveri water dispute and Mullaperiyar issues. All the speakers were students of second year  MA Applied Sociology.

Presenters

Keerthana offered the vote of thanks, by thanking Dr.Pritha Dasgupta Head of the Department of Sociology,  Dr.Victor Paul, co-ordinator of the Departments of Sociology and Social Work, Dr.Thomas Daniel, the guiding light for the event, Suparna Majumdar Kar, our Class tutor, Dr. Maya, Dr.Sudhansu Bala Sahu, Dr. Om Prakash, Dr. Shaji Isaac, and all the students of  MA Applied Sociology. The master of the ceremony was Ann Tresa Roby, the photographer was Varsha and this report has been prepared by Annie Chirayath.

The participants