The PC in an Indian urban slum: enterprise and entrepreneurship in ICT4D 2.0

This paper examines the embedding of information and communication technology (ICT) tools in everyday practices among underserved populations in urban India. Using ethnographic investigations of PC-aided micro- and small enterprises (MSEs) in a low-income slum neighborhood in Mumbai, it pursued three broad research goals: first, to etch out organic ICT immersions in underserved technology environments; second, to articulate a new and evolving socio-technical system in an urban slum ecology; third, to seek a fit between goals of ICT for development and impacts of PC-aided enterprise on ICT access and adoption. Based on the ICT4D 2.0 approach interrogating the technology-for-development discourse, this paper substantiates the need for a “new view of the world's poor: one that views the poor not as passive consumers but agile agents and innovative producers of ICT products and services.”     

THE NATURE AND ORIGIN OF AUTHIGENIC CHLORITE AND RELATED CEMENTS IN OLIGO–MIOCENE RESERVOIR SANDSTONES,TAPTI GAS FIELDS,SURAT DEPRESSION,OFFSHORE WESTERN INDIA

Reservoir sandstones in the Mid‐ and South Tapti gas fields in the Surat Depression (Mumbai Offshore Basin, western India) have been investigated using a range of petrographic techniques, isotope geochemistry and basin modelling. Authigenic chlorite is abundant in the shallow‐marine sandstones of the Miocene Mahim Formation, a major reservoir rock in the Mid‐ and South Tapti fields, which are described here in terms of their quality and diagenetic characteristics. The sandstones are currently at burial depths of between ～1500 and 2800m. The authigenic chlorite has had a significant impact on the resulting reservoir quality of the sandstones and is interpreted to have originated as odinite clay of the verdine facies that replaced faecal or pseudo‐faecal pellets, together with volumetrically small but abundant grain coatings and grain rims, and formed at the site of major riverine iron influx onto the shallow‐marine shelf during periods of relatively low sea level. Pellets have been variably compacted to form pseudomatrix. Reservoir sandstones from similar depositional settings on the west coast of India or other sub‐tropical settings are likely to exhibit comparable diagenetic effects on reservoir quality. Compositionally, the chlorite is the iron‐rich form known as chamosite. The chemistry of all the chlorite morphologies is the same in all studied samples. Oxygen isotope analyses of carbonate cements in the Mahim Formation sandstones have provided an approximate temperature framework for diagenesis of the non‐carbonate cements. Oxygen isotope results for the chlorite, however, suggest much higher temperatures than its position in the paragenetic sequence would warrant. These results suggest that the clay formed first as 1:1 layer clays, in this case odinite, which were then transformed to Fe‐chlorite as burial depths and temperatures increased. Reservoirs in the Mahim, Daman and Mahuva Formation sandstones are thus greatly influenced by the diagenesis of authigenic chlorite and locally by the precipitation of carbonate cements. Reservoir quality is good where thick, continuous chlorite rim cements are present and where chlorite pellets are sufficiently indurated for them not to be compacted. Chlorite rim cements have reduced the extent of quartz overgrowth cementation in the sandstones.     

Rahul Mehrotra Associates

Rahul Mehrotra maintains a diverse and active role as an architect, urban activist, writer and teacher. His book Bombay: The Cities Within (1995), with Sharada Dwivedi, is a major enquiry into the history and sociology of India's vivacious and contentious urbanism. He finds his city of practice - Mumbai - a mine for quarrying architectural ideations and languages. Unlike most regions in India that may have to adhere to a conformist cultural agenda, Mumbai offers a conceptual freedom in traversing the traditional and contemporary as the city has its particular plurality in the intertwining epochs, attitudes and ‘coming together and moving apart of the past and present’. Multiplicity is thus axiomatic in Mehrotra's interpretation of the city, although this is transferred in his architecture as a dialogical juxtaposition of public and private, exteriority and interiority, natural and industrial materials, and the traditional and contemporary. Interiority, arising both from reasons of climate and urban conditions, is an abiding theme in Mehrotra's work and is articulated through reified courtyards and walls that also retain an intimate conversation with the larger landscape. From residences to large complexes, he uses these elements with great craft and finesse to create dramatic spaces with changing palettes of materials, colours and phenomenally modulated differences between the exterior and interior.‘In our projects, the approach has been to abstract and interpret spatial arrangements as well as building vocabulary,’ he says. ‘The idea is to combine materials, to juxtapose conventional craftsmanship with industrial materials and traditional spatial arrangements with contemporary space organisation. In short, to give expression to the multiple worlds, pluralism and dualities that so vividly characterise the Asian landscape.’ Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

In Depth: Inscribing the Indian Landscape

When India was colonised by the British in the 18th and 19th centuries, it was systematically surveyed and delineated in map form for administrative and political purposes. Here, Anuradha Mathur and Dilip da Cunha urge a new, ‘deeper’ reading of the landscape that fully acknowledges the multiple uses and potential initiations of public spaces. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Re-thinking urban planning in India: Learning from the wedge between the de jure and de facto development in Mumbai

Cities in the global south are undergoing changes in the production structure brought about by globalization and liberalization. These cities also witness significant informalities in terms of shelter and livelihoods. These phenomena are reflected in the urban land use patterns. Planning in these cities is under pressure to adapt to the dynamic urban condition but is constrained by the technical and bureaucratic process of master/development plan making. Through an empirical study of an area in the suburbs of Mumbai (India), this paper shows the wedge between planned and actual land use and discusses the reasons for this dichotomy. The paper argues that master/development plans based on technical principles with micro-level detailing are unable to foresee and hence or otherwise adapt to the economic dynamics and spatial restructuring in Mumbai; they are partly undermined by “occupancy urbanism” (Benjamin, 2008). We discuss how these factors are accommodated within and outside the scope of the development plans. The paper calls for a re-thinking of urban planning in India so that plans are better able to reflect the requirements and needs of the citizens.     

Supersudaca’s Asia Stories (aka at Home in the First,Second, Third,Fourth and Fifth Worlds)

The architecture network Supersudaca is best known for its research projects on Latin America and the Caribbean. Here they describe their experiences as they shifted their focus to Asia and the Middle East in a super-tour that took in Kuala Lumpur, Tokyo, Dubai, Mumbai, Dhaka, Phnom Penh, Singapore and China. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Upgrading of Mumbai High vacuum residue

Upgrading of waxy Mumbai High vacuum residue was carried out at four different temperatures, viz. 430, 445, 460, and 475?°C in an autoclavable reactor. The temperature difference between the material at the wall and at the centre of the reactor was found to be as low as 0^οC and as high as 10^οC depending upon rate of coke formation at different severities. Maximum coke formation (23.31?wt%) was found at 475?°C and for the reaction time of 60?min. Maximum liquid and gas yield was found to be 55.96?wt% and 16.9?wt%, respectively at 475?°C and for the reaction time of 90?min.     

印度城市居住贫困及其贫民窟治理——以孟买为例

伴随工业化和城市化进程,以孟买为代表的印度城市,因人口集聚、生活成本高和贫富分化严重等原因而形成的城市贫民窟不断增加的居住贫困问题,严重影响了城市发展和现代化进程。印度政府在居住贫困问题的应对措施,以及孟买在解决贫民窟问题上的经验教训,对中国城市在快速发展时期保障性住房建设及城中村治理具有一定的启发和借鉴意义。     

Chris Lee/Kapil Gupta

With both its architects working from separate cities, Chris Lee/Kapil Gupta is the face of the increasing number of transnational practices now encompassing India, and evidence of the long-term international associations that architectural education now enables. Chris Lee Architects is an international practice based in London which is informed through research conducted at the Architectural Association, where Lee has taught since 2002. Gupta is design principal at Contemporary Urban India and the Director of Research and Publications at the Urban Design Research Institute, Mumbai. Being fascinated by the evolution and mutation of building types in today's cities, Lee and Gupta explore the issues that lie at the intersection between architecture and urbanism with a particular focus on developing new relevant types for these environments. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.