BENGALURU: Global and Indian firms are flexing their industrial muscle to help the world s second biggest population battle coronavirus, coming to the rescue of a public health system buckling under the weight of surging infections and deaths.
Amazon.com, Intel and Google, as well as Indian firms Tata Sons, Reliance Industries and JSW Steel have pitched in with everything from airlifts of medical equipment and funding pledges to making medical oxygen. What we need is better planning with the recognition that government s capacity is limited and therefore requires private participation, said economist Madhura Swaminathan of the Indian Statistical Institute in Bengaluru.
From Amazon to Tata, industry steps up to combat India s coronavirus crisis reuters.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from reuters.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
By Prof Utpal K De, Dr Arjun Kumar
Everyone is well aware of the uses of statistics how data is used to reveal some facts like changes of some variables over time and across communities depending on various aspects of society. Also, data is used to correlate various factors and form welfare policies. However, there are several abuses of statistics too. For example, a positive change in any aspect might directly be credited to its respective policy.
However, we ignore the other side impacts or external factors due to which the change might have occurred. If one excludes these factors, one might realise that the policy, by itself, might have had minimal impact.
Partha Nath Mukherji, one of the eminent sociologists of the country, former director of Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai and past president of the Indian Sociological Society, died on 12 February 2021 at the age of 81. His death brought to a close the career of one of the giants of his generation and a significant participant of over half a century history of Indian sociology.
Mukherji’s distinguished teaching career included periods of service at Patna University 1963–70, University of Delhi 1970–72, Jawaharlal Nehru University 1972–79, and the Indian Statistical Institute 1980–96. He was a much sought after academic given his talents, scholarly vision, and above, all professional integrity. He was offered the director’s position of the Tata Institute of Sciences, Mumbai in 1996 and of the Council for Social Development, New Delhi in 1999 to 2001. He also served as the secretary and the president of the Indian Sociological Society. Towards the last pha
The answer, of course, is to have a society based on human values other than buying or selling. To arrive at this society, we need a good deal of planning and a good deal of struggle, which, if the best comes to the best, may be on the plane of ideas, and otherwise who knows?
–Cybernetics, Norbert Wiener, 1948
These profoundly radical words from Norbert Wiener (1894-1964) echo Malcolm X’s call to address structural racism in society “by any means necessary”. Yet Wiener is hardly known as a revolutionary. In fact, by the beginning of the 21st century his name was hardly known at all. Given that he is arguably the foremost 20th century thinker and commentator on the relationship between technology and society, this is unfortunate.