Dear Friend of the OICSD,
Welcome to the latest issue of the OICSD newsletter featuring quarterly updates on our research, scholarships and seminars.
As start the new academic year at Oxford, we look ahead to new plans for Michaelmas Term 2024 and reflect on the past summer at the OICSD. Our highlights include our annual OpenAg symposium which focused on Transforming Food, Water and Energy Security through Agriculture. Ten new scholars from India joined the Centre studying topics ranging from impact of climate on Himalayan glaciers to India’s space-related laws and regulations. And as the new term begins, we continue to engage on our plans and strategy for research translation and impact through our seminars and events.
Research Publications
OICSD Programme Director Dr Siddharth Arora co-authored a paper on “Probabilistic forecasting of daily COVID-19 admissions using machine learning” published in the IMA Journal of Management Mathematics. The team proposes a quantile regression forest (QRF) model for probabilistic forecasting of daily COVID-19 admissions for a local hospital trust (aggregation of 3 hospitals), up to 7 days ahead, using a multitude of different predictors. The paper finds that that QRF model outperforms univariate time series methods and other more sophisticated benchmarks. Read the paper here.
Dr Vikranth Nagaraja and Dr Anant Jani (OICSD Research Associates) co-authored “Reimagining India’s National Telemedicine Service to improve access to care” published in The Lancet Regional Health – Southeast Asia. The paper assesses the efficiency of India’s free-to-use National Telemedicine Service, eSanjeevani, and proposes measures to re-imagine eSanjeevani to become a more effective tool towards improving public health outcomes and achieving universal health coverage in India. Read the paper here.
OICSD Research Associate Dr Maan Barua released his new book “Plantation Worlds” published by Duke University Press. This is his second book after Lively Cities: Reconfiguring Urban Ecology published last summer. In Plantation Worlds, Dr Barua interrogates debates on planetary transformations through the histories and ecologies of plantations. Drawing on long-term research, the work presents an ethnography attentive to the lives of both people and elephants amid tea plantations in the Indian state of Assam.
Research Translation and Impact Events
OpenAg Symposium 2024
We hosted the fourth edition of our annual flagship OpenAg Symposium in September 2024 at Said Business School. The symposium, co-hosted with our supporters UPL, focused on “Power Plants: Transforming Food, Water and Energy Security through Agriculture” and highlighted the role of security. Dr Julius Maada Bio, President of Sierra Leone, delivered a substantive and insightful keynote.
During the discussions, we continued to build on our work on the future of sustainable agriculture in a changing climate. The plenary panel set the tone for the conversation by discussing how various forms of securities interact with agriculture. The two breakouts discussed the specific roles of water security and energy security in relation to agriculture.
OpenAg 2024 hosted a stellar line-up of speakers including Mr Daniel Zeichner MP, Minister of State for the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs in the UK Government; Ms Juliet Davenport, President of the Energy Institute; Mr UnniKrishnan Nair, Associate Director of Climate Change and Sustainability – Commonwealth Secretariat; Ms Usha Rao-Monari, Former DG of UNDP; Ms Sabrina Rajan, Director of Sustainability – McDermott; Prof. Daanish Mustafa, Professor of Critical Geography at King’s College London, among others. The full list of speakers is available here.
OICSD New Scholars for 2024
The OICSD welcomed ten new scholars in this academic year, spanning degrees in Public Policy to Criminology and Justice. The incoming cohort continue to work on addressing challenges to achieving sustainable development goals in India. The research areas of the scholars range from the legal discourse on criminalisation of marital rape to India’s approach in space laws and regulations, and finding the key determinants of mental health disease in India. We are also delighted to launch three new scholarships as the Centre continues to grow as the largest scholarship awarding body for Indian students at Oxford. Read more on the OICSD website.
OICSD Term Card 2024
Like every year, the OICSD has some exciting events lined up for this Michaelmas Term.
We start with a collaboration with Nature, Oxford’s ZERO Institute and the Oxford Climate Research Network on 28th October to discuss research translation into policy. The event, “From Research to Policy: The Nuts and Bolts of Effective Communication” will feature Subhra Priyadarshini, Chief Editor – Nature India and Ehsan Masood, Bureau Chief of Editorials at Nature Portfolio who will be sharing their insights on how can researchers communicate their work effectively.
Other events include our termly OICSD Research Showcase, a launch of a visual and historical journey of the British East India Company and the Raj Period, and the former Indian Solicitor-General Mr Gopal Subramaniam speaking on “Sexual Violence in India: The State of Legal Reforms”.
You can sign up for the events here. For any queries, write to us on oicsd@some.ox.ac.uk.
Announcements
Congratulations to our newest doctor – Dr Gauri Chandra.
Gauri joined the OICSD as the Rakesh and Ritu Kapoor Scholar in 2019 reading for a DPhil in Public Policy at the Blavatnik School of Government. Her research analysed how big corporations leverage behavioural science within their internal policy mechanism to address externalities. Her research contributes empirical evidence from three stand-alone experiments focusing on scalable solutions for two global policy issues relevant for sustainable development – the first paper addresses plastic pollution and the next two papers reflect on online health-related misinformation.
Gauri has now joined the Boston Consulting Group (BCG) as a subject-matter expert in Behavioural Science. She currently leads a project with a government agency in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, focusing on enhancing human capital development. Her research portfolio includes large-scale randomised controlled trials conducted both online and in field settings, in collaboration with private and public sector organisations across India, the Middle East, and the U.K.
Scholar in focus: Fahad Zuberi
Fahad joined the OICSD as the Indira Gandhi-Radhakrishnan Scholar in 2023 to read for the MSc in Modern South Asian Studies. His work focuses on the intersection of architecture and violence, particularly in South Asian contexts.
Before Oxford, Fahad taught Architecture and Design Philosophy at CEPT University and at National Institute of Design in Ahmedabad as a visiting faculty and is a columnist and political commentator with several Indian platforms such as The Indian Express, The Hindu, The Wire and The Hindustan Times. Fahad has worked as a comics journalist, in electoral politics, and seldom composes music. He is the Producer of Mutant: The Democracy Podcast — conceived as a contemporary dictionary of politics — with Institute of New Global Politics and his first feature length film as a Music Director – Kayo Kayo Colour? – premiered at IFF, Rotterdam 2023
Fahad has recently joined as a PhD candidate at the Department of Architecture at the Massachusetts’ Institute of Technology, US. His proposed research will continue to build on studying the relationship between architecture and violence in South Asia.
