November 23, 2012
NEWS FROM THE SOUTH ASIA INITIATIVE  
Happy Thanksgiving from SAI! We have an exciting line up of seminars next week -  please see below for more details.

Best of Harvard in India Round table on Accountability and Governance
The South Asia Initiative, in collaboration with the Harvard Business School India Research Centre, as part of the 'Best of Harvard in India' series of round tables on "Accountability & Governance" hosted a second  roundtable entitled "Transparency to Address Corruption and Lobbying in India," on Thursday, November 22 in Mumbai. The roundtable was chaired by Karthik Ramanna, Associate Professor of Business Administration and the Henry B. Arthur Fellow at the Harvard Business School.  Please check SAI's website for more on this event, including a white paper, coming soon.  The first roundtable in the series, titled "Transparency, Awareness, and Action - Understanding the Landscape of Accountability in India," was held in July 2012 and was led by Tarun Khanna, Director of the South Asia Initiative at Harvard University and the Jorge Paulo Lemann Professor at the Harvard Business School.  A white paper created for the roundtable as well as other details can be accessed here.
  
Anwarul Quadir Foundation To Fund Student Internships in Bangladesh.
SAI is pleased to announce that the Anwarul Quadir Foundation will support Fellowships for two Harvard students to travel each year to Bangladesh to intern at established business in Dhaka, to promote understanding in the Harvard community of the social and entrepreneurial progress in Bangladesh.  
SPOTLIGHT ON UPCOMING SAI SEMINARS AND EVENTS 

 

Monday, Nov. 26: South Asia Without Borders Seminar Series.  Angana Chatterji,  Berkeley University will discuss "Naxalism and Orissa: Divergent Conflicts, Political Economy, and Minoritization." Sanjeev Uprety, Tribhuvan University in Kathmandu will present "Neat and Laundered Middle Classes and Third Gender Nepal Communist party-United Marxist Leninist: Masculinity and Politics in Contemporary Nepal." Michael Witzel, Wales Professor of Sanskrit, Department of South Asian Studies will chair the event. Learn more.

  

Tuesday, Nov. 27: Indian Education As Seen By An American Educator on His First Trip To India. In January-February 2012, accompanied by his wife Ellen Winner and his son Andrew Gardner, both educators, Howard Gardner, Professor of Cognition and Education at Harvard Graduate School of Education made a seven city, three and one half week trip to India. Gardner will speak informally about his impressions of precollegiate education in India, a collaboration that he and his team are carrying out with a chain of schools across India, and some aspects of education in which India differs from China and the US. Tarun Khanna, Jorge Paulo Lemann Professor at Harvard Business School and Director of SAI, will chair the event. Learn more.   

 

Nov. 27: The Tameer Story: An Asian Response to Grassroots Challenges. Nadeem Hussain, Founder, President and CEO, Tameer Micro Finance Bank Ltd, Pakistan will discuss the financial revolution which the Tameer Bank is bringing to Pakistan by financially empowering people at the grassroots level, including innovative work such as branchless banking and solar energy. Professor Asim Khwaja, Harvard Kennedy School will be the discussant, and Nasim Zehra, Fellow, Harvard University Asia Center will act as the moderator. The event is co-sponsored by the Modern Asia Seminar Series, Harvard University Asia Center; co-sponsored with the South Asia Initiative at Harvard University, the Harvard Kennedy School Pakistan Caucus, and the Harvard Pakistan Student Group. Learn more here.

 

Nov. 29: Film Event: Quarter Number 4/11. The film is a ground zero perspective of urban real estate development, as witnessed by director/cinematographer Ranu Ghosh and narrated through the plight of an ex-factory worker Shambhu Prasad Singh, a victim of this development in Calcutta's South City, a residential complex-cum-shopping mall-cum-school for the wealthy. Ranu Ghosh, Documentary Director and Screenplay Writer, Jaya Bhagat, Edward S. Mason Fellow 2013, Harvard Kennedy School, and Ajantha Subramanian, Professor, Social Anthropology Program, Department of Anthropology, Harvard University will discuss the film. Learn more here.  

 

Nov. 30: Souls in the Kalyug: The Politics and Theologies of Migrant Workers in Delhi. Shankar Ramaswami, Visiting Associate Fellow, Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, Delhi will discuss his research.  Parimal Patil, Professor of Religion and Indian Philosophy, Chair of the Department of South Asian Studies will chair the event. Learn more. 

 

ANNOUNCEMENTS

The South Asia Studies Department will host four upcoming lectures:
Caste and Conflict in Contemporary Central India with Bhrigupati Singh, Brown University - 11/26@4 PM
The World's Largest Democracy and its Depravities with Anastasia Piliavsky, Kings College - 11/28 @ 4 PM
The Bay of Bengal: History and Ecology in an 'Asian Century' with Sunil Amrith, Birkbeck College, 12/3 @ 4PM
'Soldiering' Sustainability: Urban Ecologies and Political Imaginaries in Kathmandu and Mumbai with Anne Rademacher, NYU, 12/5 @ 4PM. For more information about all of these lectures, click here. 

Dec. 4: SAVE THE DATE for the SAI Winter Gathering. The event will be held at 4:30 PM in the CGIS Concourse, 1730 Cambridge Street.Click here for details.  

 

Dec. 16: SAVE THE DATE - SAI Summer Grant Opportunities Open House. 4 PM, S030, CGIS South.  

Learn more here! 

 

 
  
CGIS South Bldg, 1730 Cambridge St., Cambridge MA 02138
617-496-4862, sainit@fas.harvard.edu

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