The greatest contribution of this pandemic has been the rupture of the idea that progress is infinite, and as professionals we need to be on the treadmill called the resume. There was jobless growth, now we are in a post jobs world, and growth is measured in the mortuary and in the number of hospital beds. There is surely ‘growth’ in edutech and healthcare, if that can be referred to as secular growth. This is stepping in to maintain the new normal, trying to replicate the old life.

We are trying to hold on to the pre pandemic normal by clutching to the bare threads of the fabric of normalcy. Now a days, heading to the market is a health risk. This fact itself does make any talk of economic green shoots inedible.

In extending Sociologist of Risk Ulrich Beck’s work we have entered the phase of the ‘Meta Risk’ Society’ and are undergoing a simulation of a submerged world of climate change of 2100, where all the risks need to be managed. I get reminded of the a16z note of learning to build again. Only this time building for survival and a fresh start is needed.

#thoughtleadership

#writing

This term of the BJP is for long standing ideological projects as have been seen. This mandate shall not be wasted and things will be done in a hurry after TT, CAA, Mandir. There is electoral sanction for it. The AAP and INC have celebrated it. After the Delhi polls i had written in my column for The Tilak Chronicle that the electoral software has been rebooted, and each party is deeply Hindu apart from AIMIM. The right firmament is now also on the center. Shiv Sena is with the Congress and NCP, both parties having secular credentials. AAP is BJP lite with AK63 speaking to Times Now.

Rabri on the boil, outside a favourite daily in Hadapsar, Pune in a Social Distancing way. The whiff of the intoxicating saffron in the air cannot be grasped in a still photo. The olfactory dimension is the limitation of this artistic medium. The everyday during the pandemic is punctuated by the sensory. Food is a site to gauge the continuity of the everyday.

Where it is Bhojpuri Bidesia folk songs or Malayali Kathu Pattu, letter songs between north Kerala and the Khaleej, or Bangaldeshi migrant poets in Singapore, songs and poetry are oral archives of love and longing for migrants are powerful.

Anniversaries/Birthdays are occasions to make time and consecrate the ritual marking and hence making life, a pause in this pandemic to say a mumbling prayer in the midst of a stillness which all of us have been mulled in to, a normal which has been forced upon us, a language deeply insufficient for our times. Metaphors are empty of valency, and meanings need to be refreshed, hence the residues of normalcy need to be celebrated with souls who care.

Such an honor to be presenting on the social and ethical dimensions of tech in the 5 day Faculty Development Program by BIT Mesra on ‘AI & ML in Healthcare’.

A deep gratitude to Dr Koel Mukherjee and Dr Sahu, the program committee coordinators for their sincere efforts in curating this digital learning space for academics by academics and for placing social and business topics in a highly technical program. In the spirit of interdisciplinary thinking espoused by the New Education Policy 2020, this intervention creates the correct ripples for post event conversations. It was kind off surreal that my former teachers from BIT’s Oman Campus attended my talk.

The talk was based on STS frameworks and the digital-society interface to an audience of scientists. #ThoughtLeadership