It still surprises me to see such an openly diverse country such as India where people never forget their common identity makes them all the same—Indians. Everyone seems to accept one another for many of their differences, and it also appears that relationships break boundaries between social constructs. The population varies between Hindu, Christian, Muslim, Sikh, Jain, ...
SOU 310: India Past and Present
Tiger Past and Present
There is about 2,500 tigers estimated to be in india today, representing about 70% of the worlds tiger population. This is a relatively scarce number and is the result from centuries of hunting taken place from the Mughals, British, and various poachers. However conservation effects such as project tiger have helped to increase these numbers, and sets the population up for ...
Go Fish – Community Involvement in Fishery Conservation
We visited the Andaman Islands a few weeks ago to learn about their rich biodiversity, conservation of their ecosystems, and the history of their development. Part of our time was spent with ANET (the Andaman and Nicobar Environmental Team) who taught us about those various subjects and led field trips into the community and around the coastal ecosystems. One of the field trips ...
Enemies Forever?: The Indo-Pakistani Tussle Over Kashmir
When I started the visa application for India, I noticed that I had to answer several questions regarding my connection to Pakistan. Filling out the required forms, the Indian government inquired on whether the applicant had familial descendents of Pakistan or not, including grandparents, parents and spouses, and if the applicant had ever visited Pakistan. The repetitive ...
Kālā Pānī: A Brief Overview of the Cellular Jail
During our trip to the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Sophia, Heather, and I decided to visit one of Port Blair’s most important monuments: The Cellular Jail. We walked up the hill until we reached the main entrance, and for 30 Indian rupees we got to see one of the most breath-taking historical sites that I have ever visited. Not only does the jail represent the transitions of a ...
What’s with all the Tea?
Everywhere you go in India, you are offered tea. The offer of chai is everywhere from on the train before you travel back to Chennai to a lonely street on the Andaman Islands before you go to a national park. The constant offer of chai makes you wonder after a while, why is it absolutely everywhere? How did such a simple drink of just leaves and hot water make it so big that ...
Population Control Policy in India: A Dark History Uncovered
Today, India is the world’s second most populated country, second only to China by a gap that is shrinking each year. Looking back a century to the early 1900’s, India was a very different place. The population was unstable due to intense famine, influenza outbreaks, plague, and malaria. Individually, these outbreaks took major tolls on the country, but the combination of all ...
Violence Against Women in India
Today is the day you’ve been looking forward to. You’ve been asking for a sibling for as long as you can remember. Your whole family has waited in anticipation for the birth. As you sit in the hospital with your family, you notice everyone is on the edges of their seats. It’s like they’re on a game show and have just answered the million-dollar question except they don’t know ...
Child Marriage: The Unspoken Reality and Its Impacts
“Little did I dream then that one day I should severely criticize my father for having married me as a child.” This excerpt is taken from Mahatma Gandhi’s autobiography; as an adult he recognizes the immorality behind the fact that he was married off at the age of thirteen without being fully conscious or being asked his opinion. This freedom fighter’s story is not ...
Rickshaw-shank Redemption
Travelling in Hyderabad and Chennai has had frustrating moments. Technology provides apps and services like Uber and OLA where as a group, we can rely on hailing a ride to locations at a usually low and affordable cost. But time and effort put into hailing a vehicle over a cellular device can cause too much frustration. Short fused, we usually have to resort to alternatives. ...
