Work From Home is a facility anchored in a certain degree of privilege, and a few assumptions. One the employee will have a laptop, a steady wifi, no powercuts as well a dedicated space at home with silence and no distraction. In most desi homes these are not a given. Will companies also pay for the internet and the coffee? Or these are built in to the pay structures? As we make #WFH normal, these are questions to wrap our heads around.

This is the era of surveillance capitalism, and over the last couple of days there has been incriminating articles in the HuffPost India regarding the creation of an Orwellian state. There is nothing to create, we are in the age of Pegasus where Bezos’s phone can be compromised. There are retina scans at airports, finger prints everywhere and we are datafied. Where ever I have lived, each entry and exit, transactions and the granular details have been mapped. Indian academics carrying OCI cards have been very vocal, and the arguments have a point. The question however is, why are they not contesting bio politics in their adopted lands or is all their activism dedicated to South Asia, obviously most of them are poco scholars working with ‘marginalised communities’ here.

Data security and privacy is an imperative in the digital era, however most of us are simply oblivious or simply not even aware of the rights and redressal mechanisms. The effort should start with the education.

How will #sustainability and #stakeholderengagement professionals adapt to the move to the ‘cloud’ in the era of #COVID19 where site visits and meeting communities for public consultation is a part and parcel of the job. Let’s begin with our strengths, that is HSE. We advice on safety matters especially in remediation so we have our basics pretty sorted.

Client meetings can be zoomed, but how do we substitute meeting communities which are on the other side of the digital divide or open up new registers such as chat rooms where internet access is available or Skype, which is then transcribed.

Can site visit data for ESIAs and Audits be supported by drones and other spatial data? Can local academics and universities help in order to curtail travel? These are some of the questions which can lead to interesting openings for conversation.

How are amending our methods for the pandemic will help us create applicable knowledge for clients and the wider community of practice.

Amazing book by Prof Chinmay Tumbe of IIM A, an economist turned migration scholar and business historian. Eclectic research which mainstreams migration studies as labor and capital flows in a networked thinking approach in to the corpus and canon of business research. Insightful data and narratives light up the pages, and makes India as i always believe is a common economic market. Migration is a highly networked web of social capital. It is also about labor arbitrage and a story of aspirations and fears.

Sacred Geographies. Masjid/Mandir. Devachi Uruli. Pune Rural.