Amarendra Kumar Das

Humanising urban development in India: call for a more comprehensive approach to social sustainability in the urban policy and design context

Social sustainability is gaining importance in the international urban development context; however, in India, the concept is unclear and under-represented. New approaches and tools at the level of urban policy, design and implementation are highly biased towards environmental sustainability focussing on “smart” technological innovations. This scant focus, coupled with massive and inequitable urban growth, is resulting in social crises that not only pose danger to the country’s stability but also represent some of the fundamental challenges to its sustainable future. Based on a detailed review of the literature on social sustainability, this paper explores its meaning and sets out its core components. It calls for humanising Indian cities and argues that a more comprehensive approach to the constituent but neglected “social” dimension of sustainable development which goes beyond the technical aspects of solving infrastructure-focused social issues to creating built environments that nurture strong urban communities is necessary. Analytical findings are translated into the social sustainability framework, which suggests a combination of (micro-level variables of) bottom-up and (macro-level variables of) top-down approaches in its implementation, because nurturing social sustainability in cities needs both, planned context and emergent actions.

‘What Ideality Tool’ (WIT) for Product Design Briefs

This paper discusses the relationship between the ‘WHAT’ and ‘HOW’ concepts in the design process through the innovative ‘What Ideality Tool’ (‘WIT’). The abstract tool draws on nature ideality principles, crossing from the traditional static flowchart model to a dynamic automation tool, promoting design procedures by focusing on the ‘WHAT’ as a creative engine, instead of skipping ahead to the ‘HOW’. Many product designers rush into a design solution without thorough analysis of a product’s intended purpose. Applying ‘WIT’ in the ideation stage to create the designer brief serves as a preemptive tool for handling cognitive obstacles; this results in the paradox wherein the more experienced a designer is, the less flexible the design approach becomes. Hence, their range of ideas essentially becomes their ‘fixed design style’. The ‘WIT’ approach enriches designers’ mindset abilities, expanding the creativity flow by exposing distant connections, and promoting sustainable attributes necessary in today’s market.

Role of Human Computer Interaction in Building the User Interaction Layer for Citizen Facing Government Websites

The E-Government Systems built for Government to Citizen (G2C) services are with the objective of providing quality services, in the minimum possible time. The user experience of a citizen begins from the time of receiving the information about a service and its benefits and accessing the service through multiple channels to the final interaction with the system itself. The end-to-end experience of the interaction that the citizen has with the system can be termed as the human-system or human-computer interaction (HCI). The different stages combine to form the user experience. This paper highlights the present challenges in the existing Government Websites, focused for those under the Government of Assam and the efforts being taken by the Government of Assam in ‘Standardization of Websites’. It takes into consideration many important aspects but key among them being: the role that the interaction nature of citizens play while designing such citizen-facing websites: what are the deeper problems in the system that is preventing its wider usage; how the citizens interact with the system and their experience in terms of usability, usefulness and the level of satisfaction; are the interaction patterns of the service delivery to the users adequate. Are the services being provided in the right manner; do the citizens get what they look for in the minimum time with minimal efforts. Since there are many departments within the Government of Assam, how does one resolve the question that the user is within the Government of Assam website and not out of it? The principles for establishing a generic framework for building effective, interactive and usable systems are brought out in this paper so that these can be embedded during the design stage life cycle of systems.

Personal 3D Printer: Self-design and Manufacturing

Rapid advancements of 3D printing technologies have created new opportunities and challenges. The material extrusion and the stereolithographic 3D printers, which were recently launched in a desktop size, herald a new time whereby common people will be able to own manufacturing means in their home. The prime motivation of this study was driven from the gap that existed between the market that offers desktop 3D printers, along with access to 3D printed products, and the users which still had not widely adopted this new technology. The study was derived from a wider continuous research that examined the personal desktop 3D printing market, and to better understand the existing situation, the study reviewed 5 CAD softwares oriented at product design for non-professional users and 16 websites that offer 3D printed parts and products.

Design Modularity in the Assistive Devices for the Elderly People

India although has the largest numbers of young people, numbers of elderly people are also increasing. However with aging, human being starts losing their physical prowess and ability to take care of themselves. Various assistive devices have been already designed and manufactured outside the country so far for the elderly people. These assistive devices enable them to be self-dependent in carrying out their daily tasks. One of the very useful assistive devices for elderly with mobility impairment is a powered wheelchair, controlled manually and automatically in special cases but except providing mobility it cannot solve other problems associated with an elderly person. Every elderly person has different disabilities and adding each feature will only increase its cost. This paper deals with various issues of disability in the elderly people and incorporating modularity in the assistive to provide mass customization.

Design Intervention for Terrace Cultivation in the Hilly Region of North Eastern India

In the North Eastern Region (NER) of India, agriculture has been a source of livelihood for majority of the population. The farmers of the region practices two distinct types of farming namely Jhum cultivation and terrace cultivation. In spite of huge potential of the region for agricultural and horticultural produce, its productivity falls below the national average. Agriculture in the hilly areas of NER faces numerous challenges due to factors such as traditional farming methods, use of poorly designed tools, tough terrains, and also lack of good agricultural practices, irrigation, mechanization, power for mechanization, transportation networks etc. This research is to facilitate terrace farming through design intervention by designing an appropriate system. Initial challenge is to design tools that can be manually used and followed by tools that can be used with small engine to form terrace.

Idea-to-Market: Product Innovation Sustainability in Challenging Health-Care Context

The challenge of sustainable development is now recognized worldwide. There are large numbers of products locally innovated to suit particular context. However these are never available in the market in absence of their commercial manufacture that can have been mutually beneficial to innovators and users and also to Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs). Design aspect concerns emergency medical transportation services to marginalized people of the society in rural areas. A case in hand is rural health service in rural areas of India; National Rural Health Mission (NRHM) has launched boat clinic to make health services available to the rural population. But many places in North Eastern India are totally inaccessible by road. In this respect, design of amphibian featured new tricycle ambulance was initiated and the acceptance by the beneficiaries were studied and the research works has given very positive results and this work has established the vital contribution of design for bringing this innovation to market.

On Site Testing of a Zero Head Vertical Axis Helical Water Turbine for Power Generation

The need of an efficient, low cost and environment friendly hydraulic energy converter provides motivation to many researchers to contribute in the field of renewable energy. In the present investigation, one such requirement is addressed for the possibility of electrical power generation from free stream of water. The implementation of such a low head or zero head turbine does not require a dam for energy conversion, thereby making it a low cost and environmental friendly source of power generation. The present study deals with the development of a zero head vertical-axis helical water turbine, and its subsequent testing in an open channel. The main parameters that influence the performance of a helical water turbine are its blade profile, aspect ratio, helix angle, number of blades and solidity ratio. Considering these parameters and the numerical work reported in literature, a three-bladed helical turbine has been developed and tested under different loading conditions. The variation of power coefficient at various tip-speed ratios of the turbine has been investigated and analyzed.Copyright

Stylistic Analysis of Space in Indian Folk Painting

The paper aims at identifying the design principles of Indian folk painting by analyzing some paintings of master painters from Srikalahasti, Madhubani, and Raghurajpur. The authors further discuss the different initiatives to reinterpret the effectiveness of storytelling through graphic visuals among mass. The age-old chitrakatha tradition of narrative paintings with oration, as an intrinsic part of Hindu folk religion has played a significant role in the proliferation of the doctrines of Hindu epics and moral stories. The space division aims at an optimum clarity for impelling communication. The dimensions are often mandatory rather than arbitrary. Yet, often esthetic overpowers the theme. The authors as evaluators adopt the method of three folded analytical study of semiotic, iconic and thematic aspects. The tradition of narrative folk paintings although has emerged and grew in remote and isolated locations but is not confined to the temples and rituals anymore because of cross cultural exchanges. They are rich as artistic expression and potent enough to amalgamate and evolve with time. The paper, therefore briefly opines on the significance of folk art practice in the changing society.