Govind Gujar: entomologist's journey to understand the Society we live in

  12 December 2021 Recent news (9 th Dec 2021) about New Zealand’s reported move to ban smoking for next generation by 2025 was a nice welcome read. It reminded me of my smoking experience in the past. It must have been in early 1960s that I smoked handmade roll containing aswain (caraway) seeds to take care of colds. I did so either because my mother told of benefits of aswain seeds or someone suggesting that smoking aswain seeds will relieve me of colds. I must have been 10-12 years old. Besides, aswain seed eating is supposed to bring in warmth during winter. Many do eat a spoonful of aswain seeds plain or salted limed regularly the same way as they eat aniseeds (fennel or saunf) after meals, as these are supposedly digestive too. Next time I smoked a cigarette was when I was in college in early 1970s and I used to have a company of my college mates during annual educational tours, and was away from praying eyes of my elders at home. Although it was an occasional experience for

  A housewife is not housewife but rightfully she is a homemaker. She works day and night for the members of her family, and this work is largely unrecognised, leave alone being paid any way. She cares for elderlies in the home, as most parents live with their grown-up children. Comfort of family depends up on her labour and sacrifice. Her contribution as a progenitor of next generation and its raising and educating is far greater than anyone, even of her husband. And hence, the Supreme Court of India under the three-member bench headed by Justice N V Ramana recently awarded equal compensation to wife as well as husband in the motor accident case, rejecting the earlier judgement of Delhi High Court that housewife do not work or do not add economic value to the household. It is reported that woman on an average spend 5 hr a day on unpaid domestic services for household members in the country. There are as many as 159.85 million women doing household work as compared to 5.79 million men.

                    20 November 2021      Today’s (19 th Nov) news on the repeal of three farm laws is in a sense breaking news. Nobody expected such an announcement, as the Indian Government had repeatedly held its ground on the farm laws that these are in the interest of farmers. It had agreed to revise the laws to the extent to remove prejudices against the farmers' interests or to meet the purpose of natural justice. Earlier, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), the party in power had repeatedly vilified the farmers’ protests calling them names. And hence, this development is a sudden U-turn. Prime Minister Narendra Modi talked of sincere efforts of his Government to improve the farmers’ conditions through enacting these laws. He felt that the Government failed in convincing the farmers their merits and sincerely apologised to the farmers and people for the hardship they suffered. These farm laws were passed a year ago against which farmers especially of the North India had been pr

  It has been my dream to see the Egyptian civilization. It is one of the most ancient ones, land of pharaohs, mummies and pyramids, reportedly about 7000 years old. The sheer huge size of pyramids reportedly many times higher than the World Trade Center in New York, huge sand stones weighing as much as 60 tons each transported far away from quarries to lower Egypt near Cairo all hold every reader and every tourist spell bound. Spiced further are the movies based on Cleopatra, Julius Caesar and others. We reached Cairo in the afternoon of the 21 st Oct. by the Etihad Airline. At the airport, we had our rapid antigen tests for Covid. After 2-3 hr wait for our negative results, we sighed a relief and left airport for the Grand Egyptian Museum and the Museum of Egyptian Antiquities/Egyptian Museum near Tahrir square. A mention of Tahrir square evoked memories of uprising, peoples’ protest, that started on the 25 th Jan 2011 for about 3 weeks against the erstwhile Egyptian President Ho

  It is very disheartening to read the newspaper report on the 23 rd September 2021 that farmers in Bhatinda and Mansa have ploughed back their cotton crops (image) due to the infestation of pink bollworm. Similar cases of ploughing back the crop in soil have been reported in the past, as the pest insect has damaged the crop significantly despite insecticidal use. The pink bollworm has emerged as a key pest of Bt cotton in the past one decade as it has evolved resistance to both toxins and found congenial conditions to multiply in cotton ecosystem. The pest feeds on and bore inside the fruiting bodies, especially bolls that yield seed and lint (also called seed cotton), the very produce that we call “white gold” as it fetches cash to the farmers. Against this background, the approval in May, 2020 of commercial mating disruption formulation (PB Rope of Shin-Etsu Chem Co. Ltd., Japan) of sex pheromone (chemically a mixture in a ratio of 1.11:1.00, respectively of (Z, Z) and (Z, E) 7,1

  Today I missed the webinar on the farm related issues. This is not the first time that I missed it in recent times. I did not feel the pinch of it-no sad feeling, no self-depreciation, no resolve to make up through follow up or no not-to-forget next-time resolution. I was not like this earlier, say about a year ago. I would register for the webinar, note down the date and time in the calender app and a reminder in my phone will ensure that I participate in the webinar. Fortunately, most of the webinars are online and free. Many of them are addressed by the experts. As the science and society expand its boundaries and merge together more often, topics are diversified. And this helps to reach as many as possible. Many of them are meant to educate general public too. And some are meant for specific target groups, like farmers, social workers, academics, etc. Yet, we let them go of them. So, what is that happened to me and many-like me who may have registered for an interesting webinar