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17 Aug 2026

Kolkata | 17 August 2026  As e-commerce and logistics companies electrify delivery fleets, the next challenge is building enough charging, battery-swapping and power infrastructure to keep the transition moving. SummaryIndia’s e-commerce and logistics sector is steadily shifting towards electric delivery vehicles as companies seek to reduce fuel costs and transport emissions. Amazon has already crossed its target of 10,000 electric delivery vehicles in India, while Flipkart has reported more than 13,000 EVs in its delivery ecosystem and is working towards a fully electric fleet by 2030. However, the transition involves more than replacing conventional vehicles with EVs. Commercial fleets also require dependable charging and battery-swapping infrastructure, adequate grid connections and careful management of electricity demand. As electric fleets expand across delivery hubs and logistics networks, the availability and capacity of supporting power infrastructure will become central to the success of India’s commercial e-mobility transition. Is India’s E-commerce Sector Ready to Electrify the Last Mile?  Every day, thousands of delivery vehicles carry parcels across Indian cities. These vehicles often follow fixed routes, return to warehouses or delivery hubs and operate for long hours, making last-mile logistics one of the areas where electric vehicles can be adopted at scale. The transition is already underway. Amazon India set a target of deploying 10,000 electric delivery vehicles by 2025 and reached that goal ahead of schedule. Flipkart has set a longer-term target of making its last-mile delivery fleet fully electric by 2030. The shift is also spreading beyond the country’s largest e-commerce companies. Electric mobility firms are supplying vehicles to quick-commerce platforms, food-delivery companies and logistics operators, expanding the market for electric two-wheelers, three-wheelers, vans and other commercial vehicles. But the size of an electric fleet alone does not show whether the transition is working or not. For an EV to be useful in commercial delivery, it must be able to complete its route, recharge within the required time and return to service without disrupting operations. That makes charging infrastructure one of the biggest challenges in India’s move towards electric last-mile delivery. What Happens When the Vehicle Is Ready but the Charger Isn’t? For a private EV owner, charging can usually be planned around personal schedules. For a commercial delivery fleet, however, charging directly affects business operations. Every hour a delivery vehicle spends waiting for a recharge is an hour it is not on the road making deliveries. The challenge becomes even greater when several vehicles return to the same warehouse or delivery hub around the same time, creating a sudden increase in electricity demand. This is why companies are gradually exploring dedicated fleet-charging hubs instead of relying entirely on public charging stations. Tata Power has been expanding its charging network across public, semi-public and fleet locations, while oil and energy companies are also becoming part of the growing EV-charging ecosystem. The wider transition involves companies such as NTPC, NTPC Green, Tata Power, Reliance New Energy, ReNew, Adani Green, Indian Oil and GAIL. Their roles vary from renewable power generation and electricity supply to charging infrastructure, energy storage and existing fuel-station networks - but they are connected to the same shift towards electric mobility. The last-mile EV transition, therefore, is no longer just about replacing petrol and diesel vehicles with electric ones. But also, about building the energy and charging infrastructure needed to keep those vehicles moving.Could Battery Swapping Help Delivery Fleets Stay on the Move?  Charging time matters even more for electric two- and three-wheelers that spend most of the day making deliveries. For these high-use vehicles, battery swapping can offer an alternative to conventional charging. Instead of waiting for a depleted battery to recharge, a delivery vehicle can exchange it for a fully charged one and get back on the road. Reliance’s Jio-bp has explored battery-swapping and Battery-as-a-Service models for electric mobility, while India’s policy framework has also started recognising battery swapping as part of the broader EV-charging ecosystem. For delivery companies, the benefit is clear: less time spent charging can mean more time making deliveries. However, battery swapping also creates new challenges. Companies will also need to address key questions around battery ownership and maintenance, compatibility across different vehicle models, the location of swapping stations and who will bear the cost of setting up and operating the network.  Without common standards and enough vehicles using the network, swapping stations may struggle to reach the scale needed to remain commercially viable. Battery swapping can help reduce charging downtime, but it does not remove the need for a strong and reliable infrastructure network. Instead, it shifts the focus from charging stations to a wider network of batteries, swapping points and supporting systems.  Could Faster Charging Put More Pressure on India’s Power Grid?  One of the less visible challenges of the EV transition is its growing impact on India’s electricity network. Electric vehicles reduce dependence on petrol and diesel, but they also shift transport energy demand from fuel stations to the power grid. For commercial delivery fleets, this shift can be particularly significant because vehicles often operate for long hours and need to recharge within tight schedules. A large delivery depot could have dozens or even hundreds of vehicles requiring power within a limited period. If several vehicles charge at the same time, the local distribution network could face a significant increase in demand. This does not necessarily mean that India’s power grid cannot support the growth of electric vehicles. The bigger issue is where, when and how that electricity is consumed. Smart-charging systems can shift charging to periods of lower electricity demand. Battery storage can help manage peak loads, while renewable energy can reduce the emissions associated with charging. Careful planning can also help companies avoid placing large charging facilities in locations where the local power network is already under pressure. The move towards electric delivery, therefore, cannot be managed by fleet operators alone. Companies and electricity providers will need to plan charging capacity together so that the growth of electric fleets does not create unnecessary pressure on the power system. Can India’s Commercial Freight Sector Make the Bigger Shift to Zero Emissions? Electrifying two- and three-wheelers may be relatively easier, but heavy commercial vehicles present a much bigger challenge. Electric trucks require larger batteries, higher-capacity charging systems and careful route planning to ensure they can cover long distances without disrupting delivery schedules. India is beginning to identify priority freight corridors for zero-emission trucking, with charging infrastructure being planned along major routes. Over time, this could help connect warehouses, logistics hubs and cities through dedicated electric freight networks. However, the financial and operational challenges of this transition cannot be overlooked. Companies will need to account for vehicle purchase costs, battery replacement, charging infrastructure, land requirements, grid connections, electricity tariffs and ongoing maintenance. For investors and corporate sustainability teams, therefore, the important question is not simply whether a company has announced a target for electric trucks. The real test is whether the company has the business model, infrastructure and financial capacity to achieve that target at scale. Could Renewable Energy Make Commercial EVs Even Cleaner?  The environmental benefits of commercial electric vehicles become stronger when the electricity used to charge them comes from renewable sources. In other words, the transition is not only about replacing petrol and diesel vehicles with EVs, but also about ensuring that the electricity powering those vehicles comes from cleaner sources.This is where India’s renewable-energy and power-sector companies have an important role to play. Companies such as NTPC Green, ReNew and Adani Green can contribute to the broader clean-energy ecosystem supporting electric transport, while Tata Power can help connect electricity supply with the charging infrastructure needed by commercial fleets.   The future may therefore involve a much more integrated system:   THE LAST-MILE ELECTRIFICATION CHAIN  Renewable electricity↓Grid & energy storage↓Charging / battery swapping↓Electric delivery fleet↓Zero-emission last-mile deliveries  The success of the transition depends on how well these different parts work together. A growing EV fleet needs sufficient charging capacity to operate smoothly, while charging infrastructure must be supported by proper grid planning to avoid new pressure on the electricity network. At the same time, powering electric vehicles with cleaner electricity can further increase their overall emissions benefits.  The EV Is Only the Beginning   The real test of India’s commercial EV transition will not be the number of targets companies announce. It will be the evidence they provide on what has actually changed.  A company promising a 100% electric fleet by 2030 has set a target. It has not yet achieved an outcome.   To show real progress, companies should disclose how many electric vehicles are currently in operation, what share of deliveries they handle, how many kilometres they travel and how much petrol or diesel use they have replaced. Charging infrastructure also needs to be measured by what it can actually deliver, rather than simply the number of stations announced or installed. Similarly, battery-swapping investments should be assessed through their actual use and operational performance. The financial picture matters too. Companies should clearly report the amount they committed to the transition, the amount actually spent, the number of EVs deployed, the charging capacity brought into operation, the baseline from which progress was measured and the changes achieved as a result.This evidence can help investors assess whether electrification is becoming an integral part of a company’s operations or remains largely a sustainability commitment on paper. The bigger question, then, is whether India can electrify its last-mile delivery network without creating new pressure on the systems that support it. The answer will depend not simply on how quickly companies purchase EVs, but on how effectively the wider ecosystem develops. India needs more electric vehicles, but it also needs well-planned charging hubs, reliable electricity connections, battery-swapping networks where they make economic sense and smart-charging systems that can manage peak demand. Most importantly, companies need to report what happened after the announcement. The case for electrifying commercial delivery is strong. These vehicles operate frequently, travel extensively through cities and account for significant fuel costs. Switching to EVs can help businesses reduce operating costs while also cutting local air pollution and transport-related emissions. But replacing a petrol or diesel vehicle with an electric one is only the beginning. The vehicle may be the most visible part of the transition, but it is supported by a much larger system of batteries, chargers, electricity networks, distribution infrastructure, renewable energy and investment. India’s e-commerce boom has already created the demand for this transition. Now the energy system has to build the capacity to support it. And that is the real story of India’s electric last mile: the shift may begin with an EV, but achieving genuinely lower emissions will depend on the entire system behind it - from batteries and charging infrastructure to the power grid and clean energy.   Primary sources  Amazon India — 10,000 EV milestoneSupports Amazon’s 10,000-EV target, its achievement ahead of schedule, deployment across 500 cities and its continuing work on electric heavy goods vehicles. Amazon India — 10,000 electric vehicles milestone Flipkart — Sustainability JourneySupports Flipkart’s 13,300 EVs and its commitment to 100% electric mobility by 2030. Flipkart — Building for tomorrow: sustainability journey Flipkart — EV Assist, June 2026Supports the current figure on delivery-partner adoption, including the 6,000+ delivery-partner study and 46% willingness to transition to EVs, as well as the 2030 ambition. Flipkart — EV Assist Tata Power — Integrated Annual Report 2025–26Supports the article’s discussion of commercial/fleet charging infrastructure, with 5,800+ public, semi-public and fleet charging points and 1,200+ e-bus charging points reported as operationalised. Tata Power — Integrated Annual Report 2025–26 Reliance Industries / Jio-bp — EV and battery-swapping initiativesSupports the claims about Jio-bp exploring battery swapping, Battery-as-a-Service and charging/swapping points, including applications for three-wheelers and commercial/last-mile mobility. Reliance — Jio-bp and Mahindra EV partnership Central Electricity Authority — EV Charging Station / Power Consumption ReportsThis is the key government source for the article’s grid and electricity-demand section. CEA maintains dedicated EV Charging Station/Power Consumption Reports as part of its energy-transition work. CEA — EV Charging Station / Power Consumption Reports Ministry of Power — EV Charging Infrastructure GuidelinesSupports the article’s discussion of charging infrastructure, grid-support requirements and fast charging for long-range/heavy-duty EVs. The guidelines specify fast-charging stations for heavy-duty vehicles at 100-km intervals on designated highways and call for supporting infrastructure such as transformers and feeders. Ministry of Power — EV Charging Infrastructure Guidelines WRI India — Electrifying India’s HighwaysSupports the section on electric freight and explains why e-truck charging requires high-capacity grid connections, larger sites and carefully planned electrical systems. WRI India — Electrifying India’s Highways WRI India — Accelerating India’s Freight DecarbonizationSupports the article’s discussion of electric freight, charging constraints, corporate adoption and the structural challenges facing zero-emission trucking. It currently reports 869 electric medium- and heavy-duty freight vehicles and identifies charging infrastructure and upfront costs as major barriers. WRI India — Accelerating India’s Freight Decarbonization WRI India — Fi-ZET: Financial Impact Assessment for Zero-Emission TrucksSupports the article’s discussion of the financial and operational feasibility of electric trucks, including vehicle costs, financing and route-specific economics. WRI India — Fi-ZET           ...Read more

17 Aug 2026

How Personal Credibility Can Power Sustainable MSME Growth By Professor Ujjwal K Chowdhury Communication Specialist A sustainability startup may begin with a cleaner technology, circular product, climate solution or social mission. But before the market believes the solution, it often has to believe the human being building it. For India’s green MSMEs, founder credibility can become the low-cost capital that wins the first customer, attracts the first investor, opens the first institutional door and turns a worthy idea into a trusted movement. The challenge is not to become famous. It is to become trusted for something that matters. SummaryFor sustainability-driven MSMEs, personal branding is not vanity marketing. It is strategic trust infrastructure. Early-stage founders can rarely outspend large corporations, but they can out-explain, out-teach, out-listen, out-network and out-humanise them. A credible founder can make complex green technologies understandable, impact propositions investable and behavioural change desirable. But green businesses carry an additional burden: purpose must be supported by economics, claims by evidence, and storytelling by integrity. The founder’s journey must therefore progress from Founder Brand → Startup Brand → Category Brand → Institutional Brand. KeywordsGreen MSMEs, Sustainable Startups, Founder Branding, Personal Brand, Climate Entrepreneurship, Circular Economy, Social Enterprise, Impact Investment, Green Business, Sustainability Communication, Founder Credibility, ESG, ClimateTech, Clean Energy, Bengal Startups, Purpose-driven Entrepreneurship Hashtags#GreenEntrepreneurship #MSME #SustainableStartups #FounderBrand #PersonalBranding #GreenBusiness #ClimateTech #CircularEconomy #SocialEnterprise #ImpactInvesting #Sustainability #StartupIndia #BengalStartups #BuildInIndia #PurposeToProfit Before They Buy Your Product, They Buy the Possibility Imagine a small entrepreneur entering the market with a solar-powered solution for rural enterprises. The technology may work. The economics may make sense. The environmental case may be compelling. Yet a customer encountering the company for the first time does not possess ten years of audited performance with which to judge it. Neither does an impact investor, distributor, corporate partner, employee or journalist. They are being asked to believe in an unfinished future. And therefore, before they completely understand the company, they inevitably examine the people behind it. Who is this founder? Does she understand the problem? Has he spent enough time in the field? Can this team execute? Are the sustainability claims real? Will they still be accountable when something goes wrong? This is why, particularly during the first thousand days of a sustainability-led MSME, credibility is not decoration. It is operating capital. The company may still be unknown. The founder need not be. A logo identifies a company. A credible founder gives people a reason to examine it. That distinction can determine whether the first email gets answered, whether an incubator offers a meeting, whether an employee leaves a safer job to join, whether a CSR head takes the pilot seriously, or whether an investor agrees to hear the story. Large companies can purchase enormous attention. Green MSMEs usually cannot. But the smaller enterprise can sometimes out-explain, out-teach, out-listen, out-network and out-humanise the corporation several hundred times its size. That is the green founder's asymmetric advantage. Do Not Ask: “How Do I Become Famous?” Ask: “What Must I Become Trusted For?” This is perhaps the most important shift a startup founder can make. “Green entrepreneur” is not positioning. “Sustainability professional” is not positioning. “Visionary founder” tells the market almost nothing. Consider the difference: Generic: Sustainable fashion entrepreneur. Memorable: Building commercially desirable products from post-consumer textile waste while creating decentralised livelihoods. Or: Generic: Climate entrepreneur. Memorable: Building climate-resilient livelihood enterprises for vulnerable coastal communities. Or: Generic: Renewable-energy founder. Memorable: Developing decentralised clean-energy systems that help rural micro-enterprises become more productive. Suddenly the founder has a territory. A useful personal brand builds a mental chain: Name → Problem → Expertise → Evidence → Trust. The goal is not maximum visibility. The goal is maximum relevance among the people who can change the trajectory of the enterprise. A green MSME does not initially need one million followers. It may need 20 serious customers, ten knowledgeable mentors, ten aligned investors, ten journalists or sector communicators, ten institutional partners and a handful of people capable of opening the right doors. The founder-brand playbook therefore emphasises disciplined relationship-building over algorithmic popularity. Green Businesses Sell More Than Products. They Sell Transition. Selling an ordinary product is difficult. Selling behavioural change is harder. The sustainable entrepreneur may be asking customers to: change a familiar material; segregate waste; switch an energy source; accept an unfamiliar technology; pay differently; reuse rather than discard; alter transportation habits; trust decentralised production; change farming practices; or believe that environmental responsibility and commercial success can coexist. You are therefore not simply selling solar panels, EV technology, an upcycled handbag, bio-packaging, regenerative agricultural inputs or a waste-management service. You are selling the credibility of the transition. The stronger the behavioural change required, the greater the need for explanation. And that turns the founder into something larger than a salesperson. The founder becomes an educator of the market. Teach Before You Sell One of the greatest mistakes green startups make is turning every communication channel into an advertisement. “Buy our sustainable product.” “We are transforming the planet.” “We are disrupting the industry.” “We are revolutionising sustainability.” The language becomes bigger while the evidence remains small. A stronger founder takes the opposite route. Explain why the existing system wastes resources. Explain why recycling economics is difficult. Explain lifecycle costs. Explain why rural clean-energy adoption sometimes fails. Explain financing barriers. Explain consumer behaviour. Explain why apparently sustainable materials contain hidden trade-offs. Explain policy changes. Explain what you discovered from customers. Explain where your first prototype failed. A circular-fashion founder can teach textile waste and reuse economics. A clean-energy founder can explain financing and last-mile distribution. A ClimateTech entrepreneur can interpret climate risk and adaptation for MSMEs. A sustainable-food founder can intelligently discuss soil, sourcing, packaging, logistics and consumption. The documents recommend five particularly powerful forms of impact-founder content: problem explanation, field learning, business-model explanation, impact reporting and informed commentary on the larger system. The principle is simple: Own the problem conversation before trying to own the market. When the ecosystem repeatedly learns something useful from you, you stop appearing as another vendor. You begin becoming an authority. Purpose Is Not a Business Model Sustainability entrepreneurs often possess something extraordinarily powerful: conviction. But conviction can create a dangerous blind spot. A noble intention does not repair weak unit economics. A powerful story does not compensate for poor distribution. An SDG logo does not prove impact. A successful pilot does not automatically mean scalability. Serious impact investors eventually ask two questions: Can this enterprise become financially viable? and Can it genuinely produce the social or environmental outcomes it claims? A strong green-founder brand must therefore communicate four things simultaneously: Connection: Why do you care about the problem? Understanding: What have you learned about it? Business Model: Who pays, why, how much, how repeatedly and at what cost? Impact: What verifiably changes because your intervention exists? This is where green entrepreneurs must learn perhaps the most important vocabulary of impact: Outputs are not outcomes. Distributing 5,000 solar lamps is an output. Households consistently using those lamps, reducing kerosene expenditure or obtaining better evening study conditions are outcomes. Demonstrating durable health, educational or household-economic improvement to which the intervention plausibly contributed takes the argument further towards long-term impact. Do not make your impact claim larger than your evidence. Make your evidence stronger. An entrepreneur who tells an investor, “We have reached 10,000 households, but verified outcome data currently covers 3,200,” may appear less spectacular. The founder may actually appear more investable. Because transparency signals maturity. Heart. Head. Hands. The Green Founder's Three Tests Social and environmental entrepreneurs face an ethical burden ordinary consumer businesses may not. Their stories may involve poverty, farmers, women, climate disasters, vulnerable communities, water scarcity, waste pickers, energy poverty or public health. People cannot become scenery for the founder's hero story. A credible sustainability entrepreneur therefore requires three dimensions: Heart Empathy. Respect. Listening. Consent. Human connection. Head Economics. Systems understanding. Policy awareness. Evidence. Behaviour. Structural causes. Hands Execution. Team-building. Finance. Operations. Measurement. Course correction. Too much heart without evidence becomes sentimentalism. Too much data without humanity becomes bureaucracy. Too much founder glorification converts communities into marketing props. The discipline is beautifully simple: Tell the story. Do not steal the story. Credit local partners. Let communities possess agency. Obtain consent. Acknowledge weak numbers. Share what did not work. In green business, transparency is not a communications weakness. Transparency is a trust technology. Harish Hande: Speak About the System Around the Product SELCO offers a powerful lesson. The important founder-brand insight is not merely that Harish Hande spoke about solar energy. His public identity became connected to the ecosystem around decentralised energy: affordability, financing, livelihoods, infrastructure and underserved communities. That produces a much larger leadership territory. He is not merely explaining a solar device. He is discussing the conditions under which energy access becomes economically and socially useful. The founder-brand lesson distilled by the source is crucial: Speak about the system around your product. Finance. Behaviour. Livelihoods. Infrastructure. Policy. Distribution. Because category advocacy creates institutional relevance.  ONergy: Sometimes Friction Is the Better Story Green entrepreneurship loves success stories. Markets contain friction. And talking intelligently about friction can make founders more believable. The Bengal-linked ONergy example underscores that decentralised clean-energy adoption is not merely a technology challenge. Affordability and distribution substantially affect market creation. Hence an unusually useful communications insight emerges: “Why adoption is difficult” can be more persuasive than “why our technology is exciting.” Founders should stop pretending every sustainability transition is effortless. Show that you know why it is difficult. Then demonstrate how your business systematically attacks each barrier. That is not negative communication. That is competence. Twirl.store: Turn the Abstraction of Circularity Into a Living Story “Circular economy” can sound like language from a conference brochure. Consumers need to see it. The example of Twirl.store and founder Sujata Chatterjee connects fabric waste, upcycling and women's livelihoods. The abstraction becomes tangible. For a founder communicating circularity: show the material before; show the material after; show who collects it; show who transforms it; explain what the consumer pays for; explain the waste avoided; explain the livelihood supported; and publish only the numbers you can verify. Then “circularity” stops being jargon. It becomes an economic and human story. This approach can apply equally to recycling, construction waste, bio-materials, food waste, repair businesses and sustainable packaging. Make sustainability visible. Goonj: Sometimes the Founder Changes the Language of the Category Anshu Gupta and Goonj present another important lesson. The public framing of discarded clothing moved beyond the conventional vocabulary of leftover charity towards dignity, development and community action. That illustrates the extraordinary potential of founder communication. A founder can sometimes change not only a product category, but the language through which society understands a problem. That is category leadership. Tomorrow's great green businesses may similarly redefine: what society calls waste; what society considers mobility; what constitutes responsible fashion; what “affordable” energy really means; what sustainable food should cost; what resilient housing looks like; and what responsible consumption actually requires. The greatest entrepreneurs do not merely occupy categories. They help rewrite them. The Bengal Advantage: Build Here. Speak to the World. Bengal gives sustainability entrepreneurship an unusual intellectual and social base: design, culture, academic institutions, rural-development experience, social innovation, creative communities and a global diaspora. Yet good ventures can suffer from small communication ambition. The better positioning is not: “We are a Kolkata startup.” It is: “We are an Indian startup built from Kolkata.” And for green ventures, the opportunity becomes even larger. A Sundarbans entrepreneur developing climate-resilient livelihoods is not addressing a merely “local” problem. Lessons from coastal Bengal can be relevant to Bangladesh, Indonesia, island economies, parts of Africa and climate-vulnerable coastal communities around the world. A Bengal circular-fashion venture can participate in global textile-waste conversations. A Kolkata clean-energy company can enter international energy-transition networks. The source captures the progression powerfully: Bengal → Bharat → World Build credibility locally.Build markets nationally.Build knowledge globally. Geography need no longer determine intellectual reach. A founder can work in Sundarbans and contribute to a global climate-adaptation conversation. Turn Visibility Into Business Infrastructure There is an uncomfortable truth founders must remember: Followers do not pay salaries. Likes do not automatically produce customers. A viral reel is not necessarily an investment strategy. Applause is not cash flow. Therefore every significant founder-brand asset should possess a plausible conversion path. A LinkedIn article can lead to a technical note, case study or demonstration. A conference speech can lead through a QR code to a partnership page. A webinar can generate qualified enquiries. A newsletter can build recurring relationships. Media coverage can become sales collateral, recruitment credibility or investor validation. Networking must enter a founder CRM containing who was met, where, why the relationship matters, what value can be offered and what the next action should be. The source makes the principle explicit: Personal branding without relationship management becomes wasted visibility. Measure accordingly. Not followers alone. Track: qualified customer enquiries; demo requests; referrals; investor conversations; institutional introductions; CSR conversations; partnership meetings; speaking invitations; strong job applications; media citations; content-assisted sales; repeat stakeholder engagement; and verified impact outcomes. That is founder-brand ROI. Your 90-Day Green Founder Brand Sprint For a sustainability MSME ready to start immediately, the documents suggest a practical progression. Days 1–15: Own a Territory Choose the exact sustainability problem you want your name associated with. Interview customers. Talk to communities. Listen to sector specialists. Do not begin by proclaiming your solution. Begin by understanding the problem better than most people discussing it. Days 16–30: Build the Proof Stack Collect your genuine credentials: domain experience; prototype evidence; research; pilot learnings; testimonials; partnerships; customer evidence; and at least three impact metrics you can genuinely substantiate. Days 31–45: Build an Intellectual Identity Publish useful explanations. Share one serious field-learning story. Explain your business model plainly. Develop one distinctive but defensible point of view. Do not merely repeat the industry's fashionable language. Have something useful to say. Days 46–60: Enter the Ecosystem Connect intelligently with customers, incubators, researchers, investors, CSR leaders, journalists, policymakers and entrepreneurs. Enter with a better networking question than: “What can you do for me?” Ask: “How can I become useful here?” Days 61–75: Demonstrate, Don't Announce Publish evidence. A pilot learning. An impact dashboard. A material journey. A customer case. A before-and-after process. An insight showing what changed because customers or communities challenged your assumptions. Days 76–90: Convert Credibility Connect articles, webinars, media appearances, speeches and professional networking to: sales; partnerships; investment; talent; distribution; and customer acquisition. Then ask one ruthless question: Which activities produced serious conversations—and which produced merely engagement? Greenwashing Can Destroy in Days What Branding Built in Years Sustainability founders face one final danger. The temptation to exaggerate goodness. Do not call yourself revolutionary without evidence. Do not present a pilot as national scale. Do not inflate beneficiary numbers. Do not claim carbon reduction you cannot measure. Do not imply institutional endorsement that does not exist. Do not convert vulnerable people into marketing props. Do not confuse an award with evidence of impact. Do not decorate an ordinary business with SDG language and assume that constitutes sustainability. Impact investors specifically distrust inflated claims, unverified carbon assertions, sentimental storytelling unsupported by outcomes and generic SDG alignment disconnected from the actual business model. This is not merely about ethics. It is risk management. Employees talk. Customers compare. Communities remember. Investors investigate. Journalists verify. Digital records survive. The truth scales better than hype. AI can certainly help entrepreneurs research, organise, translate, edit and repurpose their communication. But technology should amplify the founder's mind—not manufacture one. As generic machine-produced “thought leadership” proliferates, original judgement, genuine field experience and demonstrable knowledge become more valuable, not less. And Finally, Become Smaller Than the Institution Here lies the paradox of successful personal branding. At the beginning: Founder = Company The enterprise borrows reputation from the person. Customers trust the founder. Employees follow the founder. Investors evaluate the founder. Journalists quote the founder. But if the company succeeds, the equation must change: Company > Founder Credibility must migrate. Into the product. Into processes. Into measurable outcomes. Into intellectual property. Into customer experience. Into other leaders. Into research. Into communities. Into institutional reputation. Otherwise the powerful founder becomes the company's greatest key-person risk. The destination prescribed in the founder-brand framework is therefore: Founder Brand → Startup Brand → Category Brand → Institutional Brand That is the real ambition. Not becoming an influencer. Becoming an institution builder. Not accumulating followers. Accumulating trust. Not appearing green. Building something whose sustainability can be seen, measured, experienced and believed. India does not merely need thousands of entrepreneurs selling eco-friendly products. It needs a new generation of founders capable of making sustainable choices attractive, sustainable technologies understandable, sustainable enterprises profitable and sustainable transformation scalable. So build the cleaner technology. Perfect the circular product. Solve the water problem. Create the renewable-energy model. Reimagine agriculture. Reduce the waste. Protect the ecosystem. Strengthen the community. But while doing all of this, remember that markets do not encounter ideas in isolation. They encounter people who carry those ideas. Build the solution. Prove the impact.Teach the market.Own the problem conversation.Earn the trust. Then allow your reputation to open the door through which the enterprise can grow. And never build a personal brand bigger than the truth of your business. Build a reputation powerful enough to help that truth travel farther. Because the planet does not need more entrepreneurs who merely look green. It needs founders who can make better ideas understandable, better businesses investable, better practices desirable—and sustainable change unstoppable.   ...Read more

14 Aug 2026

Kolkata | 14 August, 2026 As corporate investment in sports grows, the real CSR impact lies beyond medals - in better education, nutrition, safety and opportunities for young athletes. Summary: Sports is taking on a bigger role in India’s CSR landscape, with spending on “training to promote sports” rising from ₹311.71 crore in FY2021-22 to ₹542.53 crore in FY2022-23 and ₹692.09 crore in FY2023-24.  But higher spending does not automatically translate into greater social impact. The real measure is whether these programmes help young people stay in education, access proper nutrition and healthcare, train and compete safely, and build opportunities both within and beyond sport.  For girls and children from underserved communities, meaningful impact also requires equal access, strong safeguarding and support that continues beyond the CSR funding period. Keywordssports-for-development, sports CSR, CSR in sports, corporate sports initiatives, grassroots sports India, sports and poverty alleviation, CSR and youth development, corporate philanthropy in sports, grassroots sports academies, sports for social development, girls in sports, women in sports India, athlete development,sports nutrition, sports education, athlete safeguarding, sports talent development, CSR impact assessment, sustainable sports development, sports CSR India Can Sport Become More Than Just a Sponsorship? For years, corporate involvement in Indian sport has largely focused on sponsoring teams, tournaments and elite athletes. While this brings funding and visibility to sports, a broader approach is now gaining attention: sports for development. Under this model, sport is not just about competitions or brand promotion.   It becomes a way to give young people access to coaching, education, nutrition, healthcare, mentoring and career opportunities. The timing is important. Corporate spending on sports-related training increased substantially between FY2021-22 and FY2023-24, reflecting growing corporate support for sports development programmes. The bigger question is whether CSR reporting is also moving beyond simply measuring the number of equipment distributed, tournaments organised and participants enrolled. CSR Spending on Training to Promote Sports   Financial YearCSR SpendingFY 2021–22₹311.71 croreFY 2022–23₹542.53 croreFY 2023–24₹692.09 crore   For example, a programme that trains 500 children may look successful on paper. The real test comes after the training ends: How many participants complete the programme, remain in school, continue playing and progress to district, state or national-level competitions?These questions highlight the difference between sports sponsorship and sports for development- one supports the sport, while the other aims to use sport as a pathway to improve young people's lives.   Where Can CSR Make the Biggest Difference in Sports?  India already has a strong public sports ecosystem through programmes such as Khelo India, which supports grassroots participation, talent identification, sports infrastructure, academies and community-level sports development. This gives CSR an opportunity to fill important gaps rather than duplicate existing efforts. Companies can support areas where public resources may be limited, including specialised coaching, sports science, better equipment, technology, nutrition, travel for competitions and academy infrastructure. However, CSR support should not create another standalone programme that operates separately from existing systems. The greater opportunity lies in connecting corporate funding with schools, government sports departments, local academies and communities. Companies can bring in specialised coaches, technology and equipment, while public institutions can provide access to young athletes and existing facilities. This approach can also make the impact of CSR easier to measure. If a programme aims to increase sports participation, companies should first establish what participation looked like before the programme began. If the goal is to improve performance, there should be a clear starting point against which progress can be measured. And if the programme promises to create new opportunities, those opportunities should be visible beyond the training ground - in education, competitions, careers or continued participation in sport. From Participation to Progress: Can Girls Stay in Sport?  Girls’ participation is one of the clearest tests of whether a sports CSR programme is creating lasting opportunities rather than simply increasing enrolment. Government data shows that nearly 3 lakh women have participated in around 2,600 ASMITA leagues across 33 disciplines, while around 1.59 lakh women took part in 1,287 leagues during the 2025-26 season. These figures indicate that opportunities for women and girls to participate in sport are expanding. But getting girls onto the field is only the beginning. For many girls, staying in sport depends on factors beyond training itself. Safe transportation, family support, suitable changing facilities, access to female coaches, proper nutrition and healthcare, and protection from harassment can all play an important role in helping girls continue in sport. A CSR programme should not be considered truly inclusive simply because girls are included in its list of beneficiaries. It should also look beyond enrolment and ask: How many girls joined the programme? How many completed the training? How many continued the following year? How many progressed to competitive levels? And do they have a safe and reliable way to raise concerns or report problems? Most importantly, safeguarding should be built into the programme from the start - not added later as a compliance requirement.   How Sport Can Shape a Child’s Future  A child’s ability to participate in sport is closely linked to the circumstances in which they live. For children from low-income families, regular training can become difficult when access to nutritious food, healthcare and education is limited, or when they struggle to balance school with sporting commitments. This is why effective sports-for-development programmes need to look beyond coaching. Nutrition support can help young athletes stay healthy and recover from training, while education support can help them remain in school. Access to healthcare can also help address injuries and other health concerns that might otherwise force children to leave sport. This broader approach also changes how success should be measured. “Children trained” is an output. “Children who completed training, remained in education and moved towards sporting or other opportunities” is an outcome. The distinction matters because not every child will become a professional athlete and professional success should not be the only measure of a sports CSR programme. For some children, participation may build confidence, discipline, physical fitness, social skills and stronger engagement with education. For others, sport may open the door to district, state or national-level competition and future opportunities. Both forms of progress are meaningful, and a strong CSR programme should be able to recognise them. From Grassroots Training to Sporting Success  Some corporate-backed programmes are moving beyond one-time sponsorships and trying to build long-term pathways for athletes. The Infosys Foundation and GoSports Foundation’s Gear for Gold programme, which builds on the earlier Girls for Gold initiative, now supports male, female and para-athletes across several Olympic disciplines. Its approach combines academies, coaching, sports science, infrastructure, technology, scholarships, nutrition, injury management and competition support. That makes the model different from simply sponsoring a tournament or funding a single event. The aim is to create a complete pathway through which athletes can develop over time: Talent identification → Academy → Coaching → Sports science → Nutrition → Competition → Progression Another example is JSW Sports’ Inspire Institute of Sport, which focuses on high-performance training and athlete development across Olympic disciplines. These programmes show how corporate funding can potentially help strengthen the larger sporting ecosystem, rather than being limited to events and sponsorships. But the real test lies in the results. How many athletes enter the programme? How many continue? How many progress to higher levels of competition? What does it cost to achieve those outcomes? And how much of that progress can reasonably be linked to the CSR intervention? These are the questions that can help distinguish a well-funded sports programme from one that creates a genuine talent pipeline.   Is CSR Creating Lasting Opportunities or Just Counting Activities?  This is where sports CSR needs greater transparency and stronger evidence of impact. Companies should report the full number of people eligible for a programme, rather than highlighting only how many beneficiaries were reached. They should also report how many participants completed the programme, how many dropped out, what outcomes were set at the outset and what the programme ultimately achieved.Financial reporting needs the same level of clarity. Companies should distinguish between money committed and money actually spent. A large CSR commitment may attract attention, but a financial announcement does not necessarily mean the funds have already been used. The same distinction applies to infrastructure. Building an academy is an output. An academy that remains operational, has the right staff and resources, is regularly used and continues to benefit athletes is an outcome. Medals should also be viewed in context. A medal can demonstrate sporting achievement, but it does not automatically measure the wider social impact of a CSR programme. For example, if a programme supports 1,000 children but only 20 reach elite competition, the remaining 980 should not automatically be considered unsuccessful. Their progress may be reflected in better school participation, improved health, greater confidence, stronger social skills or continued involvement in sport. Ultimately, the success of a sports CSR programme should not be judged only by participation numbers or medals won, but by the meaningful and lasting change it creates in the lives of the people it aims to support.   Can CSR Impact Last After Funding Ends? Perhaps the biggest test of a sports CSR programme begins when the funding ends.A company may support an academy for three or four years, but an athlete’s journey does not end when the CSR cycle does. Coaches still need to be paid, equipment needs to be replaced, facilities need to be maintained, and athletes may continue to need support for travel, nutrition, healthcare and competition. If there is no plan for these needs, even a successful programme can become dependent on continuous corporate funding. Long-term sustainability therefore needs to be built into the programme from the very beginning. Companies can work with state sports departments, schools, local organisations and sporting bodies, while also training local coaches and developing systems that communities can continue to manage. The goal should be to make programmes less dependent on a single donor over time, rather than simply extending the CSR funding cycle year after year. This brings us to the bigger question: What should sports-for-development actually measure? The future of sports CSR should not be measured by how many tournaments are organised, kits are distributed or academies are launched, but by the lasting impact these initiatives create. It should be judged by the progress that continues after the activity is over. The real measure of impact lies in what happens to participants over time: Who joined the programme? Who stayed? Who completed the training? What difference did it make in their lives? Did children continue their education? Did girls remain involved in sport? Did athletes receive adequate nutrition and healthcare? Did promising players progress to higher levels of competition? Did the programme open up opportunities beyond sport? And, most importantly, what continued after the funding came to an end? India does not need CSR that simply puts more children on playing fields. It needs corporate investment that makes those fields safe, accessible and connected to real opportunities for growth. The strongest sports CSR story may not always be about the athlete who wins a medal. It could be the girl who found the support to continue her sporting journey, the child who remained in school, the athlete who gained access to essential nutrition and professional coaching, or the young guy who built confidence, developed new skills and found greater opportunities through sport. That is when sport stops being just a CSR activity - and becomes a lasting pathway to opportunity, empowerment and development.  Sources: Ministry of Youth Affairs & Sports — Khelo IndiaFor the article’s discussion of grassroots sports, talent identification, sports academies, women’s participation, disability inclusion and sport as a tool for development. Press Information Bureau — Government of India, Ministry of Youth Affairs & SportsFor the current Khelo India ecosystem, including training centres, academies, athlete support, sports science, nutrition and athlete pathways. Infosys Foundation & GoSports Foundation — Gear for GoldFor the article’s Infosys/GoSports case study covering academies, coaching, infrastructure, sports science, scholarships, nutrition, injury management, competition support and athlete progression. Infosys Foundation — Girls for Gold ProgrammeFor the article’s discussion of girls’ participation, women athletes aged 13–19, scholarships, coaching, academies and the development of sustainable sporting careers. GoSports Foundation — Programmes & Sports DevelopmentFor the broader athlete-development and academy ecosystem, including Gear for Gold and programmes supporting athletes, academies and communities. JSW Foundation / JSW SportsFor the article’s discussion of JSW’s sports-promotion work and its integration of sport with wider community-development areas. JSW Energy — Annual Report 2023–24, “Empowering Communities”Particularly relevant to the article because it documents Project Shikhar, rural boxing development, infrastructure, training and nutrition support, and collaboration with government agencies and sports associations. Infosys Foundation Annual Report 2023–24For the Girls for Gold evidence around academy-driven development, sports-science centres, athlete monitoring, international competition exposure and holistic education/upskilling.  ...Read more

13 Aug 2026

Kolkata | August 13, 2026 As the government pushes development deeper into India’s border areas, corporate CSR could bring money, technology and new livelihood opportunities- but the real test is whether those investments work beyond the launch event. SummaryIndia’s remote border villages are receiving greater attention through the Vibrant Villages Programme and other government-led development efforts. Corporate CSR can complement these initiatives by supporting areas such as off-grid solar, rural infrastructure, digital connectivity and livelihood opportunities. But reaching India’s geographic frontiers requires more than announcing projects or allocating funds. CSR interventions need to respond to documented local needs, coordinate with government programmes, involve communities and demonstrate that the money committed actually translates into functioning infrastructure and lasting benefits. For companies, the real measure of border-area CSR should therefore be what reaches communities, what changes after implementation and what continues to work once the funding ends. KeywordsCSR in border villages, corporate CSR India, CSR and rural development, Vibrant Villages Programme, VVP-II, border area development India, CSR impact, last-mile CSR, corporate philanthropy India, border village development, rural infrastructure, off-grid solar, rural livelihoods, CSR-government convergence, community-led development, CSR impact assessment, sustainable rural development, India border villages, CSR projects India, corporate social responsibility   Can CSR Fill the Gaps in India’s Border Development? For years, corporate CSR in India has largely focused on familiar areas such as education, healthcare, sanitation and rural development. Border villages, however, often require a different kind of approach. Many of these communities are located in remote and difficult terrain, far from major markets and essential services. Limited connectivity can make access to basic facilities difficult, while a lack of local employment opportunities often pushes younger residents to move elsewhere in search of work. The government’s Vibrant Villages Programme aims to address some of these challenges by improving infrastructure, connectivity, renewable energy access, education, healthcare, tourism and livelihood opportunities in border communities. As these efforts expand, corporate CSR could play a useful supporting role. However, that role needs to be clearly defined. CSR should not simply duplicate projects that government agencies are already responsible for delivering. Instead, companies can focus on gaps where private funding, technology, specialised expertise or stronger implementation support can make a meaningful difference. This could allow CSR programmes to complement government efforts while addressing specific needs that may otherwise remain overlooked. CSR support could focus on areas such as decentralised solar power, digital connectivity, livelihood opportunities, skill development and support for local businesses. The key is to address genuine gaps rather than duplicate existing efforts. A village benefits little from repeated funding for the same project when other essential needs continue to go unaddressed. The most effective CSR initiatives should therefore begin with two simple questions: What does the community actually need, and what is already being covered by government programmes? Answering these questions requires coordination with district administrations and local authorities before projects are planned. Most importantly, it means listening to local communities and ensuring that their needs and priorities shape the projects designed for them. A company may see solar power as the most urgent need, while local residents may place greater importance on roads, healthcare, irrigation, market access or livelihood opportunities. Without meaningful community participation, even well-funded CSR initiatives can end up addressing the wrong priorities. The same approach should continue after a project is launched. Installing solar panels alone does not make a project successful.  Its real value depends on whether households receive reliable electricity, whether the system remains functional over time and whether access to power improves everyday activities and livelihoods. This becomes especially important in remote communities, where repairing or maintaining infrastructure can be costly and difficult. The bigger opportunity may lie in linking basic infrastructure directly to local livelihoods and economic opportunities. Reliable electricity, for instance, could support small shops, local businesses, refrigeration, digital services, tourism facilities and small-scale processing units. Better road and digital connectivity could help local producers reach wider markets, while skill-development programmes could have greater value when they are connected to actual jobs or opportunities to start local businesses. However, these benefits should be measured, not simply assumed. Before a project begins, companies should establish a clear baseline: What is the current situation? Who needs support? And what change is the project expected to achieve? After a project is implemented, its success should not be judged only by how many people attended a programme or how many facilities were installed.Instead, companies should ask more meaningful questions: How many households are actually benefiting? Is the infrastructure still functioning? Has access or income improved? Who may still be left out? And can the project continue to deliver benefits after CSR funding ends? Government programme → CSR gap-filling → Community participation → Working infrastructure → Livelihood outcome  Effective border- area CSR should complement public programmes and end with a measurable community outcome- not simply a completed project. The real question is not how much is spent, but how effectively it is used. A large CSR announcement can create the impression of substantial investment, but a financial commitment is not the same as actual expenditure. Transparent reporting should clearly distinguish between the amount promised, the amount actually spent and the number of people who benefited. The same distinction applies to infrastructure projects. A completed building is an output; a facility that remains functional and is regularly used by the community is an outcome.   The real measure of success is not what was delivered, but the lasting difference it makes. To understand the true impact of a CSR project, companies should compare results with the situation before the intervention or with similar villages.This can help determine how much of the change can reasonably be linked to the CSR initiative, rather than to government spending, economic changes or other development programmes in the area. This is particularly important in border regions, where development is rarely the work of a single organisation. In many communities, development efforts involve multiple stakeholders, including government departments, local authorities, NGOs and companies.CSR reporting should therefore be clear about what the company actually contributed. If improved electricity access was achieved through the combined efforts of several agencies, a company should clearly acknowledge the shared contribution rather than presenting the entire outcome as its own impact.The credibility of CSR depends on accurately reporting the change a company has contributed to, rather than taking sole credit for outcomes achieved through collective efforts. The most credible CSR approach should clearly show the entire journey of a project: the problem identified, the solution planned, the money spent, the people reached and, most importantly, the change achieved.It should also explain who will maintain the project after CSR funding ends. This could involve training local operators, working with community groups or setting up a maintenance arrangement with the relevant local administration. Without a plan for what happens next, even a well-funded project can gradually become an unused asset in a village that already has limited resources. For CSR in border areas to create lasting value, companies need to move beyond the traditional question of “How much did we give?” The more important question is: “What changed because we gave it?” India’s border communities do not need CSR that is simply more visible. They need initiatives that are better targeted, better coordinated and more accountable. Ultimately, the success of corporate philanthropy is not measured by the distance between a company’s headquarters and a remote village. It is measured by the distance between a CSR announcement and a lasting improvement in people’s lives.What Should the Last Mile of CSR Really Look Like? For India’s border villages, CSR can play a valuable role-but only when it complements government efforts and responds to the needs of the communities it aims to serve.The opportunity is significant.  VVP-II covers 1,954 villages across 15 states and two Union Territories, focusing on livelihoods, connectivity, energy, infrastructure, skills, tourism and telecom access. But the scale of these efforts should not become the only measure of success. A stronger CSR approach would begin by identifying and documenting a genuine local need, coordinating with the administration and involving residents in planning. Companies should clearly define their own contribution and track more than just the money spent or assets created. The real question is whether those assets continue to function and whether they lead to measurable improvements in people's lives and livelihoods. This becomes even more important because the government has acknowledged that no third-party evaluation has yet been conducted for VVP-I. While hundreds of projects have been completed and many more are being implemented through different government programmes working together, stronger evidence is still needed to understand their long-term impact. For companies, this gap should be seen as an opportunity - not a limitation. Rather than treating border-area CSR as another category of philanthropy, businesses can approach it as a long-term development partnership, where infrastructure, reliable energy, skills and livelihoods work together to create lasting value. Ultimately, the last mile of CSR is not measured by the distance between a corporate office and a remote border village. It is measured by the distance between money being announced and meaningful change being sustained. Hence, the future of corporate philanthropy will be judged by the lasting change it helps create. Primary Sources  Ministry of Home Affairs, Government of India. Vibrant Villages Programme-II (VVP-II). 18 March 2026.Covers the ₹6,839 crore outlay, 1,954 villages, 15 States and 2 UTs, and the programme’s focus on livelihoods, roads, energisation, village infrastructure, skills, tourism, education and telecom connectivity. PIB — Vibrant Villages Programme-IIMinistry of Home Affairs, Government of India. Vibrant Villages Programme. 28 July 2026.Provides the latest VVP-I implementation figures, including projects sanctioned/completed, funds released, road connectivity, electricity, off-grid solar and other convergence projects. It also states that no third-party evaluation has been conducted under VVP-I. PIB — VVP-I Implementation UpdateMinistry of Home Affairs, Government of India. Funds for Border Area Development Programme (BADP). 1 April 2026.Important for the article's discussion of BADP, government convergence and the transition toward VVP. The release states that BADP is currently in its sunset phase, with funds being allocated for committed liabilities. PIB — Border Area Development Programme Ministry of Home Affairs, Government of India. Vibrant Villages Programme — Scheme Details.Useful for the programme's original objectives, including livelihood generation, renewable energy, roads, village infrastructure, telecom connectivity and reversing outmigration, as well as its outcome-oriented approach. PIB — Vibrant Villages Programme Background Ministry of Home Affairs, Government of India. Vibrant Villages Programme-II — Scheme/Programme Document.Details VVP-II's objectives, funding structure and focus areas, including livelihoods, electrification, roads, skills, SHGs/FPOs, tourism, education and telecom connectivity. Ministry of Home Affairs — Scheme Document ...Read more

13 Aug 2026

Summary: Crippled with financial stagnation and vagaries of monsoonal rainfall, Indian farmers are always on the subdued part of the see-saw ride. Enhancing this burden, here comes the most controversial pact of this year – the India-US Agricultural deal. Opening up like a free market to the corporate giants, this deal is sure to feed the corporate sharks let alone the hapless farmers of India. Exemption of import duties shall open the floodgates of American crops and food items flocking the Indian market, forcing the teeming millions to spend a lumsome on the imported items while the production at home is sure to lose it’s share in the market. Disastrous to the common people of India, this deal has opened many questions which are yet to be answered. Keywords: Monsoon, Indian agriculture, India-US Agricultural deal by Dr. Kanailal Das Farmers have small landholdings, so the mechanisation in agricultural sector is not a dominant feature. Moreover Indian agriculture is largely determined by the rainfall pattern of monsoon. As arrival, duration and departure of monsoon winds is uncertain, the production of crops is also uncertain, production varies from year to year. During weak or delayed monsoon production of crops is hampered. Indian agriculture is also highly labour intensive. Large share of the population is engaged in agricultural activities. Low productivity is also another major feature of Indian Agricultural System. Crop yields are lower than in many developed countries because of small farms,limited scope of irrigation and traditional farming practices . But the agriculture has the central role in Indian economy. Large numbers of population select their livelihood from agriculture. Indian agriculture produces essential food grains, vegetables, fruits, pulses and dairy products for India's large population. Many industries depend on agriculture produce. Agriculture supplies raw materials for jute and cotton textile industries. Sugar industry and food processing industries largely depend on the raw materials like sugarcane, fruits and food crops etc. Photo: Glimpse of agriculture in India (photo by author) The income of farmers is mostly uncertain and meagre. Crop prices fluctuate sharply, while the cost of seeds, fertilisers, diesel, pesticides and labour costs are increasing rapidly. Farmers with small and fragmented landholdings cannot use modern technology hence the production cost remain high, production remains low and the market prices are ever fluctuating. Droughts, floods, irregular rainfall and the seasonal and spatial variation of rainfall affect the production and the farmers get into trouble every now and then. 6th February 2026 saw the official announcement of India - US trade agreement by US president Donald Trump. The United States of America and India agreed on a framework under which India would reduce or eliminate tariffs on selected agricultural products, while the US would reduce its reciprocal tariff on Indian goods to 18%. The major features as stated are , 1. The Government of India will completely eliminate or significantly reduce import duties on all US industrial goods. 2. American food grains and agricultural products will be completely waived or drastically reduced in Indian markets . The major products include animal feed, sorghum, almonds, fruits, soybean and soybean oil, various types of pulses, dairy products, eggs and poultry meat. 3. India agrees to purchase increasingly more industrial goods in future, amounting to 45 to 50 lakh crore rupees over the next 5 years  4.  The US Government had imposed a 25% tariff on Indian goods exported to US markets. This amount of tariff will now be reduced to 18%. A 25% tariff had also been imposed on India as a penalty for importing oil from Russia ( effective from August 2025). Now it has been proposed to lift the tariff on the condition that India will no longer import oil from Russia and India will import oil from USA and Venezuela. American farmers comprise only 2% of the total population of the country and they get huge amount of subsidy, where as in India nearly 68% of the total population are engaged in agriculture with the traditional methods on the small and fragmented landholdings unsuitable for mechanised and commercial production . In India 84% of the landholdings are unprofitable . US agriculture is highly mechanised and modern in nature . The farmers are rich with large landholdings. The agriculture of America is highly commercial in nature . So Indian farmers are facing great problems as the farmers are not getting remunerative price for their crops . The price of fertilizer, seeds, pesticides and the cost of irrigation is rising heavily in India. So there is massive gap between income and expenditure in India . Under these circumstances Indian will definitely be in disaster after the India US trade deal . The import duty shield in India has long been a practice in the field of agriculture to protect the farmer's interest in international competition. Previously, this import duty averaged around 150%, after 1990,with the introduction of new economic and industrial policies it gradually dropped to 37%. And now import duties on US agricultural products will be eliminated. As a result, Indiast poor farmers will be thrown right in front of American rich farmers . Some examples can be provided , 1.  At present an import duty of 55% to 81% is to be paid to import foreign dairy products in india. After the agreement , American dairy products will enter without any import duty and it will destroy the country's dairy industry. 2. Until now the import duty on soybean was 55%, with the removal of the import duty nearly 5 crore farmers of India will be affected. 3. In India almost 4 crore farmers are engaged in poultry sector . Apart from chicken farmers produce 14,200 eggs annually. If the import duty on poultry sector is eliminated American cheap poultry products will capture the Indian market and this sector will be ruined. 4. According to the agreement US apples will enter the Indian markets without any import duty. At present apples from Britain are coming to the markets of India on the basis of an agreement signed few months ago . As a result already the apple farmers of Kashmir and Himachal Pradesh are facing problem. Again American apples, grapes, banana, orange will flood the Indian markets creating crisis . Huge production of fruits of India may be decomposed . 5. Cotton is the most important commercial fiber crops of India. India earns huge amount of revenue from cotton and cotton textile goods. According to the agreement if Bangladesh import cotton from America, the industrial finished products , the textile goods can be sold in American markets without any duty. Till date a major portion of cotton is exported to Bangladesh . After the agreement India will lose the cotton market in Bangladesh. Bangladesh will not import cotton from India and Indian farmers engaged in cotton cultivation will face great loss . 6. Disaster will also strike pulse production. Around 3 crore of farmers are engaged in the production of pulses . There is currently an import duty of around 30% on pulse imports . Once that is lifted the importers will bring pulses from America . Domestic pulse production will face devastating picture . Now the question is important , who will buy and bring the massive volume of US agricultural goods. Definitely giant import export agricultural business corporates will do this . Mainly Adani Group will play vital role in this sector . They will buy US agricultural products without import duty and sell in the markets by higher prices .. They will get huge amount of profit. But the producers of India , the Indian farmers will be in great dangers . They will not be able to lead an uneven fight with the corporates like Adani Groups. And what about Ambani? The India-us Trade agreement is highly profitable for Reliance Industries Limited. The recent agreement signed by the Reliance Industries with America involving a capital expenditure of 27 lakh crore rupees to set up a massive oil refinery in Texas will be immensely aided by the agreement. But what is the future of the common people? What is the future of the farmers and workers of the country? The farmers of India are protesting now against the agreement. The lowering of import tariffs of US products will flood the domestic markets with cheaper, heavily subsidized American agricultural products. Farmers groups under alliances like the Desh Bachao Morcha launched nationwide demonstration including a major Kishan Mahapanchayat in Delhi citing direct threats to their livelihoods . Indian Agricultural Policies  Bonfire for Corporate Companies Pyre for Peasants .AIKKMS Publication. Kheye pore banchar golpo , Moitrish Ghatak, Anandabazar Patrika , 22/4/2026 Biswajit Dhar , India -US Trade agreement,13/2/2026.   ABOUT AUTHOR   Dr Kanailal Das Masters in Geography from University of Calcutta, former senior research fellow, CSIR, PhD on Vulnerability of Gosaba, Basanti, Sundarban from Vidyasagar University. He has participated in many national and international seminars and has papers and book chapters to his credit.  ...Read more

13 Aug 2026

Sustainability is not only about saving the planet; it is also about changing the way we create, consume and live. Art and design can help us imagine a world where beauty and responsibility go hand in hand.    By Ankan Bandyopadhyay   At one point in human history, artists mainly created paintings around religion, mythology and stories of the divine. Art gradually changed as society changed. The Renaissance brought a greater interest in the individual and the human experience. Later, artists began to question traditional ideas about what art could be and where it could exist. This eventually led to movements such as Land Art, where nature itself became the subject, material and sometimes even the space of the artwork.    This relationship between art and nature has continued to evolve. Today, sustainability has become an important subject not only in art but also in design, architecture, fashion and everyday life.    Artists, writers, poets and designers are increasingly using their work to make people aware of environmental problems. Art has the power to make people stop, look and think. A painting about a polluted river may communicate something that a page full of statistics cannot. A sculpture made from discarded plastic can make us realise how much waste we produce every day.    This is where art and sustainability meet.   What does sustainability really mean?  In simple words, sustainability means using what we have responsibly so that future generations can also use it.    It does not mean that we have to stop making things or stop enjoying beautiful objects. It means we need to think about how things are made, what they are made from, how long they will last and what happens to them after we stop using them.    Take a simple example: a plastic bottle may be used for a few minutes, but the material can remain in the environment for hundreds of years. If millions of people use and throw away such products every day, the problem becomes enormous.    This is why sustainability has to become part of the way we think about design.   Design begins with a material  A designer makes choices every day. What material should be used? How much of it is required? Can it be repaired? Can it be reused? What happens when the product is no longer useful?    For example, many companies are replacing unnecessary plastic packaging with paper, cardboard or cloth. A cloth bag can be used repeatedly instead of receiving a new plastic bag every time we go shopping.    Even advertising materials can be reconsidered. Posters and hoardings often use materials that are difficult to reuse or recycle. Could some of these be made from cloth or other reusable materials? Such changes may seem small, but when adopted on a large scale, they can make a significant difference.    Businesses have an important role to play here. Sustainability cannot be the responsibility of individuals alone. Manufacturers, brands, designers and policymakers must also take responsibility for the materials they introduce into society.    What happens to our waste?  Look around us.    Garbage is often found along roadsides. Plastic bottles and wrappers collect in drains. Plastic waste enters rivers and eventually reaches the sea. Animals can mistake plastic for food or become trapped in it. What looks like a small piece of waste to one person can become part of a much larger environmental problem.    We often think of waste as something that disappears once it leaves our hands. But it does not disappear. It simply goes somewhere else.    This is why our everyday habits matter.   The practice of automatically giving a plastic bag with every purchase needs to change. We can carry reusable bags instead. We can use refillable bottles instead of buying disposable ones. We can repair things instead of immediately replacing them.    Even something as simple as having properly maintained waste bins at important public places can encourage better waste disposal. But infrastructure alone is not enough. People also need to be aware of why responsible waste disposal matters.    Sustainability begins with both systems and behaviour.    Can art change the way we think? Artists have a unique role in this conversation.    An artist does not always have to create a work that directly says, "Save the environment." Sometimes the material itself can communicate the message.    Imagine a large sculpture made entirely from discarded plastic bottles. The viewer does not need a long explanation to understand that the amount of plastic waste around us has become enormous.    This idea of transforming discarded objects into art is not new. Assemblage, for example, brings together everyday or discarded objects to create an artwork. Pablo Picasso's Bull's Head is a famous example. Picasso created the work by combining a bicycle seat and handlebars to suggest the head and horns of a bull. The work demonstrates how an ordinary object can be given a completely different meaning through creative thinking.    Artists such as Louise Nevelson also became known for constructing large sculptural compositions from found wooden objects. Her work shows how discarded or ordinary materials can be reorganised into something visually powerful.    The important lesson is that an object does not necessarily become useless simply because it has completed its original purpose.    From waste to creativity This idea became personal to me during the COVID-19 pandemic.    During the lockdown, it was difficult to purchase art materials, including paper, from stationery shops. Instead of stopping my practice, I began looking around me for materials that were already available.    I started painting on discarded milk cartons and sweet boxes.    Something that was originally considered waste became my canvas.    What began as a practical solution gradually became a creative process that I genuinely enjoyed. It made me look at everyday objects differently. A box was no longer simply a box. It could become a surface, a material and eventually a piece of art.    This experience made me realise that sustainability does not always require expensive technology or complicated solutions. Sometimes, it begins with looking at an ordinary object differently.    Learning sustainability through art  Education can play a major role in developing this way of thinking.    In schools, children often make crafts and objects as part of their work education. These activities may seem simple, but they teach children something important: objects can be transformed.    A torn piece of cloth can become a doormat or a bag. Old newspapers can become envelopes or decorative objects. Plastic bottles can become flower pots or vases. Waste cardboard can become models and sculptures.    Children can also learn about natural materials through traditional art practices.    In Bengal and other parts of India, traditional practices such as alpana, wall painting and various forms of folk art connect creativity with local materials, culture and surroundings. Pattachitra artists, for example, traditionally work with natural and locally available materials, including handmade surfaces and natural pigments.    These practices remind us that sustainable thinking is not necessarily a new invention. Many traditional communities have historically worked with local materials because they had limited resources and understood the value of not wasting them.    Modern design can learn from this knowledge.    Designing less: Dematerialisation  One important idea in sustainable design is dematerialisation.    The word may sound complicated, but the idea is quite simple: use less material to provide the same function.    For example, if a product can be made lighter without becoming weaker, less material may be required to manufacture it.    Think about packaging. Does a product really need three layers of packaging? Does a large box need to be used for a small object? Can the packaging itself be reused?    These are design questions.    A sustainable designer does not simply ask, "How can I make this product beautiful?"    They also ask:    How much material do I need?    Where does this material come from?    How long will the product last?    Can it be repaired?    What will happen to it after it is discarded?    This is where design becomes more responsible.    Designing for a circular economy  Another important concept is the circular economy    The traditional model is often:    Take → Make → Use → Throw Away    The circular economy tries to change this into:    Make → Use → Repair → Reuse → Remanufacture → Recycle.    For example, imagine a chair.    In a traditional system, a broken chair might simply be thrown away and replaced with a new one. In a circular system, the chair could be designed so that individual parts can be repaired or replaced. The wood or metal could potentially be reused when the chair is no longer needed.    The goal is to keep materials in use for as long as possible.    This is why durability, repair and reuse are important parts of sustainable design.    If a product lasts ten years instead of one year, fewer products need to be manufactured and discarded. If a product can be repaired instead of thrown away, its useful life increases.    Sometimes, the most sustainable product is simply the one that we do not need to replace.    Choosing better materials  Material selection is another important part of sustainability.    Designers can look for materials that are less harmful to the environment and consider their entire life cycle — from where the material comes from to how it is manufactured, transported, used and finally disposed of.   This applies to fashion as well.    The textile industry produces enormous amounts of waste. Designers and consumers can therefore explore natural fibres, recycled materials, longer-lasting garments and better ways of repairing and reusing clothes.    Traditional textile and craft practices can also provide inspiration. Many Indian craft traditions have developed around local materials, local skills and techniques passed down through generations.    Instead of always searching for something new, perhaps we should also learn to value what already exists.    Architecture and sustainability  Sustainable thinking does not stop at products and artworks. It is also changing architecture.    Today, architects are increasingly thinking about sustainability before designing a building. Instead of depending entirely on air conditioning, buildings can be designed to make better use of natural ventilation and shading. Local materials can be considered to reduce transportation requirements. Natural light can reduce the need for artificial lighting during the day.    The basic question is simple:    How can a building provide comfort while consuming fewer resources?  A sustainable house does not necessarily have to look unusual or futuristic. Sometimes it can simply use traditional knowledge more intelligently.    In hot climates, for example, architectural features such as courtyards, shaded windows, thick walls and natural ventilation have historically helped buildings remain comfortable without depending entirely on mechanical cooling.    Modern technology can work together with such traditional knowledge rather than replacing it completely.    Sustainability is everyone's responsibility  Artists and designers can create new possibilities, but they cannot solve the environmental crisis alone.    Businesses need to rethink production. Governments need to create better waste-management systems. Schools need to educate children. Communities need to support responsible practices. And ordinary people need to change their everyday habits.    A person carrying a reusable bag may seem insignificant. A designer reducing the amount of material in a product may seem insignificant. A student turning waste cardboard into an artwork may seem insignificant.    But sustainability is made up of these small decisions.    When millions of people make better choices, the impact becomes much larger.    Creating a different future  Art has always reflected the world around us. It has recorded our beliefs, our struggles, our cultures and our dreams. Today, environmental concerns are becoming an important part of that story.    Perhaps the role of the artist and designer today is not only to create something beautiful, useful or interesting. It is also to ask whether what we create is necessary, responsible and respectful of the world around us.    My own experience of painting on discarded cartons taught me something very simple: sometimes, sustainability begins when we stop seeing something as waste.   A discarded box can become a canvas.    An old piece of cloth can become a bag.    A plastic bottle can become a planter.    Scrap can become a sculpture.    A damaged product can become something repairable.    And an ordinary idea can become a movement when many people begin to believe in it.    We do not necessarily need to stop creating.    We need to learn how to create better.    The future of sustainable design may not be about choosing between creativity and the environment. It may be about understanding that the two can exist together.    Because when art learns from nature, and design learns to respect resources, creativity does not become smaller.    It becomes more meaningful.    ABOUT AUTHOR Ankan Bandyopadhyay (born 1986, in Kolkata, West Bengal) is an Indian painter. He obtained a BFA and MFA  in Painting from Rabindra Bharati University, Kolkata. His paintings intricately depict the evolving perspectives of individuals and society, reflecting changes in both psychology and societal dynamics over time.His works have been displayed at the CIMA Gallery (Kolkata), Emami Art (Kolkata),19th Asian Art Biennale (Bangladesh) , 62nd National Exhibition Lalit Kala Akademi (New Delhi) and many more.Presently he is a professor of Ecole Intuit Lab,  Techno India University he lives and works at his studio in Kolkata. ...Read more

12 Aug 2026

Kolkata| August 12, 2026 An unusually thick ozone layer was detected 21–23 km above the North Bay of Bengal, giving scientists new clues about how ozone-rich air moves through the atmosphere. SummaryScientists have detected an unusually high concentration of ozone over the North Bay of Bengal at an altitude of about 21–23 kilometres. The layer was thicker and more ozone-rich than normally observed over eastern India and remained for more than 24 hours.Researchers say the event was not mainly caused by sunlight-driven chemical reactions. Instead, evidence points to ozone-rich air being transported horizontally, moving downward and becoming compressed in the lower stratosphere. The finding offers new insight into atmospheric circulation over the Indian region.  KeywordsBay of Bengal ozone surge,  unusual ozone layer, ozone enhancement,  North Bay of Bengal, ozone concentration, stratospheric ozone, ozone layer India, NetRAD-ASMA campaign, ozone research India, atmospheric circulation, ozone-rich air, lower stratosphere, ozone transport, Indian atmosphere, atmospheric research India What Made Ozone Build Up Unusually Over the Bay of Bengal? The discovery came during Phase-I of the NetRAD-ASMA campaign, a nationwide atmospheric research initiative involving scientists and institutions from across India. Researchers combined weather balloons, ozone-measuring instruments, atmospheric radars, satellite observations and atmospheric models to track the movement of gases through different layers of the atmosphere. Scientists detected the unusual ozone layer at around 21–23 km above the North Bay of Bengal, significantly lower than the altitude where ozone is typically most concentrated. Under normal atmospheric conditions, peak ozone levels are generally found higher in the stratosphere, at around 25–30 km. Researchers found that ozone levels in the unusual layer were much higher than the normal levels recorded over eastern India.  The study reported an increase of around 50 nanobars above the long-term average, with the enhanced layer extending roughly 2.1–2.4 km vertically. The increase was also not a brief event. Measurements showed that the unusually high ozone levels continued for at least 24 hours and were detected during both day and night. This suggested that sunlight-driven chemical reactions were unlikely to be the main cause of the sudden ozone build-up. So, Where Did the Ozone Come From?Scientists combined data from several sources to understand how the unusual ozone layer formed.  During the campaign, researchers used ozonesondes and radiosondes, along with a network of Stratosphere-Troposphere and Mesosphere-Stratosphere-Troposphere radars. They also analysed satellite observations from Aura MLS and INSAT-3DR, supported by atmospheric models and reanalysis data to track air movement. Together, the evidence suggested that the ozone was transported into the region from elsewhere in the atmosphere rather than being produced locally. Researchers detected a persistent downward movement of air in the lower stratosphere. Their analysis suggested that ozone-rich air had been transported into the region and then gradually moved downward. As the air mass descended and became compressed, the ozone concentration increased, creating the unusual layer observed over the Bay of Bengal. Scientists also considered the possible role of mid-latitude air moving into the region and other atmospheric processes. The location of the event was significant because the North Bay of Bengal lies in a region where different air masses and large-scale atmospheric movements can interact. The North Bay of Bengal is a key region for deep atmospheric convection and is influenced by several major circulation systems. These conditions make it an important area for understanding how ozone and other atmospheric gases move between different layers and regions of the atmosphere. The study also shows why observations from multiple locations are important. During the campaign, data were collected from Balasore, Gadanki, Nainital, Silkheda and Thiruvananthapuram, along with regular observations from other meteorological stations. Comparing measurements across these sites helped provide a broader picture of atmospheric movements rather than relying on a single location. The finding does not indicate the formation of a permanent ozone layer or an ozone hole over the Bay of Bengal. Instead, it points to a temporary and unusual increase in ozone concentration in the lower stratosphere. The significance of the event lies in what it reveals about atmospheric circulation. It offers direct evidence of how large-scale air movements can transport and redistribute ozone between different parts of the atmosphere. The study, published in Earth and Space Science, offers a deeper understanding of the Indian subtropical atmosphere and the complex ways in which large-scale air movements can redistribute ozone far from the levels where it is normally concentrated. The significance of the finding, therefore, goes beyond an unusual rise in ozone over the Bay of Bengal. It is a reminder that the atmosphere is constantly moving and reshaping the distribution of gases within it. By combining detailed observations with atmospheric modelling, scientists can better understand these unexpected changes - and what they reveal about the behaviour of our atmosphere.   Primary Sources  Das, S. S., et al. (2026). “Unusual Enhancement of Stratospheric Ozone Observed Over the North Bay of Bengal: Results Inferred from NetRAD-ASMA Campaigns-2024.” Earth and Space Science.DOI: 10.1029/2025EA004791Original research paper — Wiley Online Library Press Information Bureau, Government of India — Ministry of Earth Sciences. “Scientists Discover Unusual Ozone Layer Above North Bay of Bengal.”Source: Official Government of India release on the NetRAD-ASMA findings.Press Information Bureau — Ministry of Earth Sciences NASA/JPL — Microwave Limb Sounder (Aura MLS).Source: Satellite-observation data referenced in the ozone study.NASA Microwave Limb Sounder ...Read more

12 Aug 2026

International Youth Day 2026: from “Different Contexts, Common Aspirations” to youth climate leadership, SDG acceleration, India and Bengal By Prof Ujjwal K Chowdhury International Youth Day 2026 is not officially a “climate day.” Its theme is broader: “Different Contexts, Common Aspirations.” Yet few issues reveal that idea more sharply than climate change. From Samoa to Sudan, Kampala to Stockholm, Tamil Nadu to the Sundarbans, young people are moving from beneficiaries of development to organizers, innovators, litigants, negotiators, translators, journalists and implementers of the SDGs. The challenge now is not to praise their courage from a distance, but to give them the skills, finance, protection and institutional power to shape the future they will live in. SUCCINCT SUMMARYThe UN observes 12 August as International Youth Day following a 1998 ministerial recommendation endorsed by General Assembly Resolution 54/120 in 1999. The 2026 theme, “Different Contexts, Common Aspirations,” is built around Global Solidarity, Shared Challenges and Youth Innovation. This feature uses climate leadership as an SDG lens: climate action intersects with food, health, education, water, clean energy, jobs, inequality, cities, ecosystems, governance and partnerships. It profiles twelve global youth voices, examines practical models of youth-led action, and places India—especially West Bengal—at the centre. Bengal’s opportunity is to graduate from episodic green activities to youth climate governance through a Sundarbans Youth Climate Corps, Kolkata climate labs, Bangla knowledge systems, green-skills pathways, micro-grants and youth seats in decision-making. KEYWORDS  International Youth Day 2026; youth climate leadership; SDGs; climate justice; youth innovation; Indigenous knowledge; climate literacy; green skills; India; West Bengal; Kolkata; Sundarbans; youth governance HASHTAGS  #InternationalYouthDay #YouthDay2026 #DifferentContextsCommonAspirations #YouthClimateLeadership #SDGs #ClimateAction #ClimateJustice #GreenSkills #YouthInnovation #India #Bengal #Sundarbans #Kolkata #ActNow   12 AUGUST: NOT A GREETING CARD, A GOVERNANCE QUESTION On 12 August, the United Nations does more than “celebrate youth.” International Youth Day is a reminder that the generation expected to live longest with today’s decisions must have power in making them. The date itself carries a policy lineage. Young people at the first World Youth Forum of the United Nations System in Vienna proposed an international youth day in 1991. The World Conference of Ministers Responsible for Youth, meeting in Lisbon from 8–12 August 1998, recommended 12 August as the observance. The UN General Assembly endorsed that recommendation on 17 December 1999 through Resolution 54/120, and the first International Youth Day was observed in 2000. The purpose was deliberately larger than ceremony: to draw public attention to youth issues and strengthen awareness of the World Programme of Action for Youth. In other words, 12 August is a day of visibility, participation and accountability. It asks governments, universities, businesses, civil society and the UN system to stop treating young people as a future constituency and start treating them as present-tense partners. That is especially urgent in a decade defined by climate disruption and a race to rescue the Sustainable Development Goals. Young people are not simply inheriting climate change. They are already living through heat stress, floods, wildfire smoke, polluted air, water insecurity, displacement, disrupted education, precarious work and climate anxiety. UNICEF’s 2026 Children’s Climate Risk Report says more than a billion children face at least three overlapping climate hazards. Youth climate leadership therefore is not a fashionable add-on to sustainable development. It is increasingly one of the places where the SDGs become real.   2026: DIFFERENT CONTEXTS, COMMON ASPIRATIONS GLOBAL SOLIDARITYSHARED CHALLENGESYOUTH INNOVATIONFair access to finance, technology, education and opportunity.Jobs, education, climate, digital inclusion and mental well-being cross borders.Youth-led social enterprise, climate tools, community action and civic innovation.   The official UN theme for International Youth Day 2026 is “Different Contexts, Common Aspirations.” That distinction matters. “Youth Climate Leadership and the SDGs” is a powerful lens through which to interpret the day, but it is not the formal UN theme. The 2026 framing begins with a simple truth: a young entrepreneur in a Small Island Developing State, a student in a landlocked country, a climate organizer in a Least Developed Country and a graduate in Kolkata may inhabit radically different economies and ecologies, yet share remarkably similar aspirations—quality education, decent work, health and mental well-being, a voice in decisions, dignity and the chance to build a viable future. UN DESA organizes the 2026 observance around three connected ideas. First, Global Solidarity: opportunities for youth depend on cooperation, fair access to finance, technology, education and resources. Second, Shared Challenges: employment, education gaps, climate change, digital exclusion and mental stress cross borders even when their intensity differs. Third, Youth Innovation: young people are not simply describing problems; they are building social enterprises, climate tools, community networks and new forms of civic action. Climate change runs through all three. It exposes inequality between countries and communities; it multiplies shared risks in food, water, health, cities and jobs; and it is generating some of the most inventive youth-led responses. For young people in SIDS, climate risk can mean the physical survival of homelands. For youth in the Sundarbans, it can mean salinity, embankment failure and migration. For city youth, it can mean lethal heat, air pollution or flooded streets. Different contexts; unmistakably common aspirations.   CLIMATE IS NOT JUST SDG 13 The mistake is to place youth climate action in a box marked SDG 13. Climate leadership is an SDG multiplier. A young farmer using climate-resilient methods touches SDG 2 on hunger, SDG 8 on livelihoods and SDG 13. A student campaign for clean air intersects with SDG 3 on health and SDG 11 on sustainable cities. Mangrove restoration links climate action with SDGs 14 and 15 on oceans and terrestrial ecosystems while protecting incomes and settlements. Climate education connects SDG 4 with future green skills. Clean-energy innovation links SDG 7 with decent work. Youth participation in municipal planning and litigation activates SDG 16 on accountable institutions. Partnerships for finance, technology and scale invoke SDG 17. Young people add a distinctive political force to this web. They translate complex science into peer language. They organize through networks faster than many institutions. They expose the gap between promises and implementation. They experiment with technology and behaviour. Above all, they introduce intergenerational justice into public reasoning: what does a development decision look like when the people who will bear its longest consequences are in the room? KEY IDEA  |  Climate leadership is an SDG multiplier: one youth-led intervention can move health, education, water, energy, jobs, cities, ecosystems, justice and partnerships at the same time.  WHY YOUTH LEADERSHIP WORKS DIFFERENTLY Youth leadership also changes the method of development. Traditional programmes often begin with institutions, budgets and sectoral silos; young organizers frequently begin with lived friction—a flooded lane, an unsafe water source, plastic in a lake, a missing tree canopy, a school without cooling, a community that cannot access climate information. They then connect the problem to networks, media, science and public authority. This “problem-first” approach can make the SDGs legible at neighbourhood scale. A UN example from Mathare in Kenya illustrates the pattern. Youth-led community work around clean-ups, tree planting and water initiatives can simultaneously advance sustainable cities, climate action and clean water while mobilizing residents and local authorities. The point is not that volunteering substitutes for public infrastructure. It is that young people can act as connectors between community evidence and systems that otherwise operate at a distance. Young leaders also insist on intersectionality because their lives do not arrive in ministerial departments. A cyclone is simultaneously an education event if schools close, a health event if water is contaminated, a gender event if care burdens rise, an employment event if livelihoods disappear, and a migration event if families move. Climate anxiety similarly cannot be dismissed as a soft issue when insecurity about heat, jobs, disasters and the future affects mental well-being. The 2026 UN theme recognizes exactly this interconnectedness. Finally, youth networks are unusually capable of combining local identity with global solidarity. A student in Kolkata can learn from Pacific advocacy on sea-level rise; a Sundarbans youth group can exchange tools with mangrove communities elsewhere; an Indigenous Indian activist can connect land rights to global biodiversity debates. Digital platforms make those bridges possible, although unequal access means digital inclusion itself remains part of the agenda.   TWELVE VOICES THAT CHANGED THE CLIMATE CONVERSATION Twelve youth voices show how wide this repertoire has become. Greta Thunberg of Sweden turned a solitary school strike in 2018 into the global Fridays for Future movement. At the 2019 UN Climate Action Summit, her accusation that leaders were “failing us” made the credibility gap between climate science and political action impossible to discuss as a technical matter alone. Her enduring contribution is intergenerational accountability: targets mean little without delivery. Vanessa Nakate of Uganda brought African climate justice into a conversation too often dominated by wealthier countries. Through the Rise Up Climate Movement and work around renewable energy, schools and the Congo Basin, she has insisted that climate change is about people, livelihoods and survival. She helped normalize demands that adaptation, loss and damage and climate finance must reflect those already on the frontlines. Xiye Bastida, an Indigenous Otomi-Toltec activist from Mexico based in the United States, co-founded the Re-Earth Initiative and has pushed climate movements to center Indigenous knowledge and frontline communities. Her public argument is that Indigenous peoples are not decorative “stakeholders” in climate policy; their rights, land stewardship and knowledge must shape decisions. Elizabeth Wathuti of Kenya founded the Green Generation Initiative. Its model joins environmental education with greening schools, fruit-tree planting, food forests and an adopt-a-tree culture. Her example shows why restoration works best when biodiversity, nutrition, education and community ownership reinforce one another. Autumn Peltier, an Anishinaabe water protector from Canada, brought clean water and Indigenous rights to global forums while still very young. Her leadership reframed water security as a moral, treaty and human-rights issue—not merely an infrastructure problem. In a warming world, that is also climate adaptation. Brianna Fruean of Samoa has carried Pacific youth perspectives into global climate spaces, including COP26. Her presence makes an essential point: Small Island Developing States are not marginal to the climate debate. Their experience turns abstract arguments about sea-level rise, adaptation and finance into questions of culture, sovereignty and survival. Nisreen Elsaim of Sudan moved from activism into climate negotiation and served in the UN Secretary-General’s first Youth Advisory Group on Climate Change. Her work connects climate vulnerability with renewable energy, development, governance and security. She embodies the transition from youth being invited to side events to youth participating in policy architecture. Sophia Kianni of the United States founded Climate Cardinals, which has worked to translate climate information into more than 100 languages. That is climate justice through knowledge. If science, warnings and policy options remain linguistically inaccessible, millions are excluded from meaningful participation before a meeting even begins. Archana Soreng of India, from the Kharia Indigenous community, served on the Secretary-General’s Youth Advisory Group and advocates documenting and protecting traditional knowledge. Her core message is radical in its clarity: Indigenous people and young people should be leaders of climate action, not victims of climate policy. She places land rights, identity and ecological knowledge inside contemporary governance. Ridhima Pandey of India showed that the courtroom can also be a youth climate arena. She petitioned the Indian government on climate inaction when she was nine and later joined an international child-rights climate complaint. Her contribution is to frame climate failure as a question of children’s rights and duties owed across generations. Licypriya Kangujam of India began campaigning as a child and has pushed climate education, stronger environmental laws and public attention to pollution and disasters. Her persistence shows the importance of making climate literacy part of basic civic education rather than leaving it to specialist environmental courses. Vinisha Umashankar of Tamil Nadu represents another route: invention. Her solar-powered ironing cart was designed as an alternative to charcoal-fired street irons, linking cleaner air and renewable energy with the livelihoods of ironing vendors. As an Earthshot Prize finalist and a COP26 speaker, she turned a locally observed problem into a globally legible clean-tech idea. Together these leaders break the stereotype of the youth climate activist as only a protester. The contemporary repertoire includes protest, litigation, negotiation, translation, engineering, ecological restoration, Indigenous knowledge, entrepreneurship, journalism and policy design.   FROM PROTEST TO PRACTICE: THREE MODELS THAT SCALE Three case studies reveal why this breadth matters. First, Wathuti’s “school as ecological laboratory” model. When students plant and tend fruit trees or food forests, climate learning leaves the textbook. Children observe soil, water, shade, biodiversity, nutrition and the long time-scale of living systems. The lesson for education systems is profound: sustainability becomes a practice, not a chapter. Second, Kianni’s multilingual climate knowledge. Climate information is still heavily concentrated in English and technical language. Translation expands who can act. In India, this principle should move climate information through Bangla, Hindi, Odia, Tamil and Indigenous languages so that a cyclone warning, heat-risk protocol, farming adaptation guide or waste handbook is genuinely public knowledge. Third, Vinisha’s solar ironing cart. Climate innovation is strongest when it solves several problems together. The cart tackles charcoal smoke and deforestation pressures while preserving a familiar livelihood and adding the possibility of phone charging and mobility. That is the SDG mindset at its best: clean energy without forgetting jobs.   INDIA: FROM BENEFICIARIES TO CLIMATE PARTNERS India is one of the world’s most consequential arenas for youth climate leadership because its scale is immense and its vulnerabilities are diverse. UNICEF describes young Indians organizing in courtrooms, classrooms, neighbourhoods and online spaces; national youth statements have demanded that children and young people be placed at the centre of resilience and climate policy. The UN in India’s #WeTheChange campaign has likewise showcased young people working across renewable energy, forestry, climate finance, sustainable agriculture, disaster-risk reduction, ecosystem restoration, water and waste. There is also an institutional turn. The UNDP-TERI Mission LiFE Youth Ambassadors Programme, launched in 2026, aims to put young leaders and higher-education institutions at the forefront of sustainability through behaviour change and zero-waste campus systems. This is significant because the next phase of youth action cannot depend only on heroic individuals. It needs repeatable pathways: climate education, green skills, grants, procurement opportunities, internships, representation in public bodies and access to data. India’s youth climate agenda should therefore move from “awareness” to co-governance. A climate club is useful; a youth seat on a city climate committee is more consequential. A hackathon is exciting; seed finance and public procurement for its best solution are better. A plantation drive is valuable; youth participation in biodiversity budgeting and survival audits is deeper.   BENGAL: A LIVING CLIMATE CLASSROOM West Bengal may be one of India’s most complete classrooms for climate leadership because the state compresses multiple climate realities into one geography. In the Sundarbans, sea-level rise, cyclones, salinity, embankment stress, erosion, livelihoods, migration and mangrove ecology meet each other every day. In Kolkata, the agenda shifts to urban heat, air quality, mobility, solid waste, ponds, wetlands and development pressure. In the western plateau and northern districts, water, forests, agriculture and Indigenous ecological practices form another set of realities. “Different Contexts, Common Aspirations” could almost have been written for Bengal. The most telling youth stories are often local. In Murshidabad, UNICEF’s Community Youth Reporter Programme, designed with IMAGIN Community Media and the Press Club Kolkata, enabled 17-year-olds Rimjhim Mandal, Soumiki Chakraborty and Shraddha Sarkar to document a pond near their school that had deteriorated into a garbage dump. They did not stop at reporting. They proposed cleaning and deepening the pond, helping trigger conversations among residents and local authorities. In one modest story, SDG 6 on water, SDG 11 on communities, SDG 13 on resilience and SDG 16 on civic accountability meet. In Kolkata in March 2026, NGO SHER, Scottish Church College and TERI School of Advanced Studies brought representatives from 28 schools into a “Knowing Climate Change” workshop and launched a Climate Ambassador Programme. Students encountered climate science, urban resilience, policy, analytical tools and applications of AI in environmental monitoring. The significance lies in the progression: from climate literacy to a role identity—ambassador—and then to local projects. At Subhas Sarobar, a 2026 plogging and wetland-conservation activity organized by the West Bengal Pollution Control Board, WWF West Bengal and KMDA involved 32 students from Classes VI to VIII. A clean-up alone will not solve urban waste systems, but it makes pollution visible, turns a waterbody into a learning site and can recruit long-term citizen stewardship. These examples echo the attached source document’s larger insight: Bengal must move from scattered “green activities” to youth climate governance. SEVEN MOVES BENGAL SHOULD MAKE NOW A serious Bengal strategy could be built around seven moves. One: create a Sundarbans Youth Climate Corps. Train local young people in mangrove ecology, salinity and water monitoring, cyclone preparedness, citizen science, sustainable aquaculture, solar systems, climate communication and resilient livelihoods. Pay them where the work provides public value. Two: establish Kolkata Youth Climate Labs. School, college and university teams could audit ward-level heat, trees, ponds, wetlands, waste, mobility and energy, with standardized data feeding municipal planning rather than ending as exhibition posters. Three: launch a Bangla Climate Knowledge Mission. Translate rigorous climate science, disaster guidance and green-skills material into accessible Bangla and local dialects. Make climate knowledge usable by schools, panchayats, fishers, farmers, self-help groups and local media. Four: reserve meaningful youth participation in climate-relevant governance—municipal consultations, biodiversity committees, wetland dialogues, disaster planning and panchayat-level resilience work. Representation must include girls, rural youth, Indigenous and marginalized communities, not only metropolitan student leaders. Five: create green innovation micro-grants. Small sums, quickly disbursed, could finance prototypes in water, cooling, waste, clean energy, mangroves, sustainable agriculture and climate-tech. Pair grants with mentors and routes to procurement. Six: build a Bengal Green Skills Pathway across schools, ITIs, polytechnics and universities for solar, EV systems, batteries, green buildings, sustainable tourism, biodiversity, environmental data, ESG and climate-resilient agriculture. Climate leadership must also lead to dignified work. Seven: create district youth climate-journalism networks. The Murshidabad model shows why. Environmental damage often remains politically invisible until it is documented. Train young reporters in evidence, mobile storytelling, data, verification and solutions journalism. The principle behind all seven is the same: do not romanticize youth action while withholding power and resources.   DON’T OUTSOURCE THE CRISIS TO THE YOUNG There is a danger in celebrating young climate heroes. Governments, companies and older generations can applaud a teenager planting mangroves while continuing the policies that destroy coasts; praise students carrying steel bottles while failing to regulate industrial pollution; celebrate clean-ups while underfunding waste systems. That reverses responsibility. Youth leadership must supplement, not absolve, state responsibility, corporate accountability and adult political leadership. The right response to youth courage is not to outsource the crisis to them. It is to give them knowledge, finance, safety, institutional authority and access to decisions, while those with larger legal and economic power meet their own obligations.   LEADERS OF TODAY—BECAUSE TOMORROW IS TOO LATE Perhaps the most outdated compliment we still offer young people is: “You are the leaders of tomorrow.” For the climate generation, tomorrow is not an adequate timetable. Greta Thunberg changed political language before she could vote. Autumn Peltier addressed global leaders as a child. Ridhima Pandey used legal institutions before adulthood. Archana Soreng carried Indigenous knowledge into a UN advisory structure. Vinisha Umashankar turned a street-side observation into a clean-energy prototype. Three schoolgirls in Murshidabad used reporting to make a polluted pond a civic question. These are not rehearsals for citizenship. They are citizenship in practice. That is the deeper meaning of International Youth Day 2026. Different contexts: a Samoan island, an African school, an Indigenous forest, a Tamil Nadu street vendor, a Kolkata wetland, a Murshidabad pond, a cyclone-threatened Sundarbans village. Common aspirations: clean water, breathable air, meaningful work, education, dignity, participation, justice and a planet on which adulthood remains worth looking forward to. Young people have already answered the question of whether they care. The harder question is directed at institutions: will we give them the seat, the skills, the finance and the authority to convert concern into measurable change? On 12 August, celebration should become a contract. Listen to youth. Fund youth. Protect youth civic space. Teach climate literacy. Build green skills. Put youth into decision-making. And then judge success not by the number of speeches made on International Youth Day, but by whether a generation with everything at stake is finally allowed to help shape the future it will inherit.   SOURCES & VERIFICATION NOTES This feature integrates the uploaded YouthDay.docx as its editorial base, then independently checks the 2026 theme, UN history and key current/local claims. Current-event facts were verified on 12 August 2026 (IST). The article does not rely on unverified assertions from the source document. 1. United Nations — International Youth Day: Background 2. UN DESA Voice (July 2026) — What unites young people across borders? 3. United Nations — Closing Remarks at the 2026 ECOSOC Youth Forum 4. UNICEF — The Children’s Climate Risk Report 2026 5. UNICEF India — India’s Youth and Climate Change 6. United Nations in India — #WeTheChange youth climate leaders 7. United Nations — Youth Advisory Group on Climate Change 8. United Nations — Archana Soreng: Our voice matters 9. United Nations — Vanessa Nakate: Climate change is about the people 10. UNEP — Elizabeth Wathuti, Young Champions of the Earth 11. The Earthshot Prize — Vinisha Umashankar 12. UNICEF India — West Bengal’s Community Youth Reporters Drive Social Change 13. TERI — Mission LiFE Youth Ambassador Programme (2026) 14. Scottish Church College — “Knowing Climate Change” workshop listing, 30 March 2026 15. Times of India — 2026 Kolkata climate-literacy / Climate Ambassador workshop 16. Times of India — Students help make Subhas Sarobar plastic-free Verification caveat: As this document was prepared at the start of 12 August 2026 in India, it relies on UN DESA’s official July 2026 IYD framing and the April 2026 ECOSOC Youth Forum remarks for the 2026 theme and pillars. No unverified 2026 Secretary-General IYD message is quoted. ...Read more

11 Aug 2026

August 11, 2026 | Kolkata Bangladesh has launched three villages as SDG Villages, bringing sustainable development goals closer to everyday rural life. The experiment offers India a possible blueprint - but an Indian model would need to add climate resilience, local livelihoods, digital access and community- led planning to suit the country's diverse villages. SummaryBangladesh has launched an SDG Village pilot across three villages, bringing poverty reduction, healthcare, education, water, sanitation, livelihoods, women's empowerment, environmental protection and infrastructure together under a single local development plan. For India, the initiative highlights the possibility of developing SDG Villages across states, each designed around its own geographical and social challenges while using existing Panchayat-level systems to track and measure progress. KeywordsSDG Villages, Sustainable Development Goals, Bangladesh, India, Rural Development, Panchayati Raj, Sustainable Rural Development, Climate Resilience, Community Development, SDG Localization Can Bangladesh’s SDG Village experiment offer India a blueprint for turning global goals into local action? Bangladesh has taken the Sustainable Development Goals from national policy to the village level through its first SDG Village pilot. On August 10, Prime Minister Tarique Rahman inaugurated three villages under the initiative: Mitingachhari in Rangamati, Pankhali in Khulna and Nafanagar in Dinajpur. The villages were selected to represent different geographical and socioeconomic conditions. The idea is to bring several development priorities together instead of addressing them through separate programmes. Health, education, clean water, sanitation, livelihoods, women's empowerment, renewable energy, environmental protection and digital access are all part of the approach. This matters because rural challenges rarely exist in isolation. Poor connectivity can affect education, healthcare and employment at the same time, while water shortages can influence health, farming and household incomes. The pilot is therefore testing a simple but important idea: Can the SDGs become a local development plan rather than remain mainly national targets?  Why should India pay attention to three Bangladeshi villages? The question is not whether India should copy Bangladesh. India's villages are far more diverse in terms of geography, population and economic conditions. But the broader lesson is relevant: development works better when national goals are connected to local needs. India already has systems that could support such an approach. The SDGs have been localised through Panchayati Raj Institutions, while the Panchayat Advancement Index assesses Gram Panchayats across areas linked to sustainable development. This means India may not need another standalone scheme. Instead, existing systems could be used to identify demonstration villages across states and build development plans around their most urgent needs. The process could begin with a village-level baseline covering health, education, poverty, water, sanitation, livelihoods, energy, environment, digital access and climate risks.   What Would an SDG Village Change on the Ground? For ordinary residents, the SDGs matter only when they improve everyday life. Can families access safe drinking water? Can children receive better education? Can farmers increase their incomes without damaging natural resources? Can women access healthcare and livelihood opportunities more easily? Can villages prepare for floods, droughts, cyclones or extreme heat? An Indian SDG Village should be built around these practical questions. However, every village should not receive the same development package.  A coastal village may need to prioritise cyclone preparedness, mangrove restoration, safe drinking water, fisheries and saline-water management. A drought-prone village may focus on rainwater harvesting, groundwater recharge, efficient irrigation and climate-resilient farming. Himalayan villages could prioritise landslide preparedness, spring-water conservation, resilient infrastructure and responsible tourism. Agricultural regions could focus on soil health, crop diversification, storage, food processing and farmer-led enterprises. The Northeast could place greater emphasis on connectivity, healthcare, biodiversity, digital services and locally owned businesses. Tribal and forest-dependent communities may need stronger support for nutrition, healthcare, forest-based livelihoods and biodiversity protection. The principle should remain simple: one national framework, different local priorities. But who decides what a village needs? This is where community participation becomes essential. An SDG Village cannot be planned entirely from government offices. The Gram Sabha should play a central role in identifying the problems residents consider most urgent. A farmer may prioritise irrigation. Women may identify healthcare, water access or employment as bigger concerns. Young people may want better digital connectivity, skills and local job opportunities. These priorities should directly shape the village development plan. Government departments can then bring existing schemes together around those needs instead of making residents navigate multiple programmes separately. The result could be a more coordinated system: one village plan, multiple government programmes and one set of measurable outcomes. How can India make sure it is more than a label?This may be the biggest challenge. India already has numerous rural development schemes. The problem is often not a lack of programmes, but weak coordination, uneven implementation and limited measurement. An SDG Village should therefore be judged by outcomes, not announcements. If a water project is completed, officials should measure whether households actually receive reliable, safe water. If a skill-development programme is introduced, its success should be reflected in employment or income. If healthcare facilities improve, residents should be able to access services more easily. \Each village could publish an annual SDG scorecard covering a focused set of indicators such as water, health, education, livelihoods, gender, environment and resilience. Funding should follow the village plan. Existing government schemes can form the foundation, while state and local resources fill gaps. Businesses, universities and civil society organisations can provide valuable expertise where needed, but the needs and priorities of local communities should remain at the heart of the model. Most importantly, the approach should allow programmes to be reviewed and improved along the way. If an intervention does not deliver the expected results, it should be changed and strengthened rather than simply marked as successful. Could Bangladesh’s Village Experiment Work for India? Bangladesh's initiative is still a pilot, so its long-term success will depend on implementation and whether the approach can be replicated effectively. But its central idea is worth watching. India already has the policy architecture needed to localise the SDGs. What it can strengthen is the connection between village-level data, community priorities, government schemes and measurable outcomes. A national SDG Village programme could begin with demonstration villages across every state and Union Territory. Each village could follow common national indicators while adding priorities based on its geography, economy and climate risks. The goal should not be to make every village follow the same development model. Instead, each village should receive the resources and support needed to address its own local challenges. As Bangladesh tests whether sustainable development can begin at the village level, India has an opportunity to build on the idea by turning SDG Villages into real-world models for water security, climate resilience, livelihoods, healthcare, education and inclusive rural development.   The true measure of success will not be the signboard at the village entrance, but the difference people can actually see and feel in their everyday lives.  Sources: United Nations in Bangladesh – Sustainable Development Goals (https://bangladesh.un.org/en/sdgs) Bangladesh Planning Commission / Social Security Policy Support – Local Collective Action for Accelerating SDGs (https://socialprotection.gov.bd/2026/01/local-collective-action-for-accelerating-sdgs/) United Nations Statistics Division – Bangladesh SDG Localization (https://unstats.un.org/capacity-development/UNSD-FCDO/bangladesh/) United Nations University – Localisation of Sustainable Development Goals in Bangladesh (https://collections.unu.edu/view/UNU:8935) Sustainability – Localisation of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in Bangladesh: An Inclusive Framework under Local Governments (https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/14/17/10817) United Nations in Bangladesh – SDG Localization & Gender-Disaggregated Data (https://bangladesh.un.org/en/316977-advocacy-session-gender-disaggregated-data-collection-advance-sdg-localization-bangladesh) Ministry of Panchayati Raj, Government of India – Panchayat-level SDG Localization (https://panchayat.gov.in/) NITI Aayog – Sustainable Development Goals India (https://sdgindiaindex.niti.gov.in/) UNDP – Sustainable Development Goals (https://www.undp.org/sustainable-development-goals) ...Read more

10 Aug 2026

Kolkata | August 10, 2026 Employee mental health is moving beyond the HR department as companies, regulators and investors look at wellbeing as part of the “S” in ESG. The real test, however, is whether such programmes create measurable improvements in workers’ well-being- not merely whether an activity was organised. Quick SummaryWorkplace mental health is becoming harder for companies to treat it as a private HR matter. Employee-assistance programmes, counselling access and wellbeing initiatives are gradually appearing alongside broader workforce and social disclosures, while burnout, absenteeism and attrition are gaining attention as potential business risks. But measuring workplace wellbeing remains difficult. A company can report how many employees had access to a programme without showing how many actually used it, completed it or benefited from it. The gap becomes even wider for blue-collar, contract and gig workers, who may have fewer avenues to access mental-health support. As investors pay greater attention to the social side of ESG, the question is shifting from whether a company has a wellness programme to whether it can demonstrate a meaningful outcome from it. Can Employee Wellbeing Become an ESG Metric Investors Can Trust? For years, workplace mental health was largely treated as an HR responsibility. Companies organised counselling sessions, wellness workshops and employee-assistance programmes, often presenting them as workplace benefits aimed at improving employee morale. That approach is now changing. Mental health is gradually being linked to wider business concerns such as employee retention, absenteeism, productivity, workplace safety and governance risks. For investors examining the “S” in ESG, employee wellbeing can offer valuable insight into how responsibly a company manages one of its most important assets- its people. This shift comes at a time when corporate sustainability reporting is also becoming more structured. Under India's Business Responsibility and Sustainability Reporting (BRSR) framework, workforce-related information has become part of the broader discussion on responsible business practices. This creates an opportunity for employee wellbeing to move beyond general promises and become an area that can be assessed through clear evidence. But an important question remains: What should companies actually measure? Reporting that an employee-assistance programme exists only shows that support is available. It does not reveal how many employees used the service, whether they received continued support or whether the programme led to meaningful improvements. The gap between providing access and demonstrating results could become one of the biggest tests of credibility in workplace wellbeing reporting. The same applies to spending. A large budget for wellness programmes may look impressive in a sustainability report, but the amount spent alone cannot show whether the investment reached employees who needed support or whether it produced meaningful results. The challenge becomes even greater when looking beyond corporate offices. A wellbeing programme designed for salaried employees with access to private healthcare may not work in the same way for blue-collar, contract or gig workers, who may face different working conditions, financial pressures and barriers to accessing support. The real question, therefore, is no longer simply whether Indian companies are paying greater attention to workplace mental health. But whether their ESG reporting can provide credible evidence that these efforts are actually improving employees' wellbeing and working lives. Are Companies Measuring Wellbeing or Just Counting Participation? One of the biggest challenges in bringing workplace mental health into ESG reporting is measurement.  Companies can easily count the number of wellness programmes conducted, workshops organised or employees covered by an assistance programme. But these figures do not necessarily show whether employees are actually benefiting from them or not. This distinction is important because a programme can reach thousands of employees on paper while having very little real impact. A counselling service may be available across an organisation, for example, but only a small number of employees may use it. Others may hesitate because of stigma, concerns about confidentiality or simply a lack of awareness about the support available. This makes utilisation, completion and outcomes more meaningful indicators than programme availability alone. For investors, the difference can provide a much clearer picture of a company's social performance. Saying that 90% of employees have access to mental-health support shows the scale of the programme. Reporting how many employees actually used the service, completed the intervention and continued receiving support provides a better indication of whether that investment is making a difference. The same caution applies to employee burnout and turnover. High attrition may signal problems within the workplace, but it cannot automatically be linked to mental health. Factors such as salary, workload, management practices, career growth and job security can also influence an employee's decision to leave. This is where stronger ESG reporting can provide greater insight. Companies should also establish a clear baseline before measuring change, otherwise improvements in employee wellbeing cannot be meaningfully compared over time. Rather than relying on a single indicator, companies can look at employee turnover, absenteeism, engagement, workplace safety and access to wellbeing support together. Examining these factors side by side can help identify whether workforce wellbeing is becoming a broader business risk. Another important issue is who is actually covered by the data. A company may report strong wellbeing support for its permanent employees while excluding contract workers, outsourced staff or gig workers from the same programmes and disclosures. For businesses that rely heavily on such workers, this can create a significant gap between reported performance and the reality of the workforce. The expectation, therefore, is shifting from simply counting programmes to measuring the people they actually reach and the difference they make. A credible wellbeing metric should provide a clearer picture of who received support, who used it, what outcomes followed and whether support continued when required or not. Without such evidence, workplace mental-health reporting risks becomes another list of ESG activities rather than a meaningful measure of how a company is supporting its people. Wellbeing Beyond the PayrollThe corporate conversation around mental health often focuses on employees who are easiest to reach: permanent, office-based staff with access to HR teams, digital platforms and private healthcare. But India's workforce is much more diverse, and workers facing the toughest conditions may have the least access to mental-health support. For blue-collar workers, long hours, physically demanding jobs, safety concerns and limited flexibility can add to everyday pressures. Yet counselling and employee-assistance programmes may not be as accessible to them as they are to office employees. Shift workers may struggle to attend sessions during regular hours, while language barriers, limited awareness and concerns about confidentiality can discourage them from seeking support. The challenge can be even greater for contract and gig workers. Their relationship with a company often runs through contractors, vendors or digital platforms, creating uncertainty about who is responsible for providing mental-health support. As a result, a company may report strong employee-wellbeing figures while a significant part of its workforce remains outside formal support systems. This raises an important ESG question: Who is included when companies measure employee wellbeing? A narrow reporting boundary can make a company's social performance appear stronger than the experience of its wider workforce. For businesses that depend heavily on contract or outsourced labour, credible reporting should clearly state whether these workers are included, excluded or covered through separate arrangements. There is also a barrier that participation figures cannot fully capture: stigma. Employees may avoid counselling because they fear being judged, labelled as unable to cope or treated differently by managers and colleagues. Simply providing a helpline or counselling service, therefore, does not guarantee that employees will feel comfortable using it. Closing this gap requires more than an annual wellness campaign. Support must be accessible, confidential and trusted, and it needs to reach workers across different locations, shifts and employment arrangements. This is where the difference between wellness programming and a genuine wellbeing strategy becomes important. A wellness week may create awareness for a few days, but a meaningful ESG approach asks a deeper question: can workers access support when they actually need it, and is the company also addressing the workplace conditions that contributes to stress in the first place? Absolutely. I’d make this one tighter, more analytical and mass-friendly, while keeping the ESG and impact-measurement angle clear. I’d also avoid making it sound like a conclusion. When Wellness Becomes a Box-Ticking Exercise As workplace wellbeing gains importance in corporate ESG discussions, a new concern is emerging: are companies improving employee wellbeing, or simply adding mental-health initiatives to their ESG checklist?  A wellness week, meditation session or counselling app may show that a company is taking action, but it does not necessarily prove that employees are benefiting. This is where the difference between activity and outcome becomes important. An activity-based approach records what a company has done, while an outcome-based approach looks at what has changed as a result. For investors and other stakeholders, the second measure offers a much clearer picture of social performance. A more meaningful assessment could therefore consider indicators such as participation, programme completion, repeat use of support services, absenteeism trends, employee feedback and continuity of care. None of these measures can establish a direct cause-and-effect relationship on their own, but together they can show whether wellbeing initiatives are reaching the people they are intended to support. Investment also needs closer attention. If a company spends significantly on employee wellbeing, stakeholders should be able to understand how spending relates to the number of workers covered and the support provided. Budget allocation does not necessarily mean the money was spent, and spending alone does not demonstrate impact. Stronger reporting would connect financial investment with measurable reach and longer-term outcomes. Privacy is another critical concern. Mental-health information is highly sensitive, and employees may avoid seeking help if they fear that their participation could become known to managers or affect their careers. Companies therefore need clear rules on confidentiality, data collection, storage and access to employee information. This makes governance an important part of the “S” in ESG. A wellbeing programme cannot be considered effective simply because it exists. Employees must also feel safe, respected and confident enough to use the support available to them. The wider ecosystem is also expanding beyond corporate HR teams. NIMHANS-affiliated workplace-health initiatives, mental-health organisations such as the Live Love Laugh Foundation and worker-health institutions such as ESIC are part of a broader push towards improving access to mental-health support. Their relevance to ESG, however, should be assessed through measurable reach, outcomes and continuity rather than the visibility of individual programmes. Large employers such as Infosys, TCS, Wipro, ITC, Tata Steel and JSW Steel, along with major banks and other listed companies, offer useful examples of how workplace wellbeing is being incorporated into employee policies and sustainability reporting.  However, the real comparison should not be based on who has the most visible wellness programme. It should focus on who provides wider access, protects employee privacy, measures outcomes and maintains support over time. From Wellness Activity to ESG Outcome What companies reportWhat investors should askEAP availableHow many employees actually used it?Wellness sessions conductedWhat changed afterwards?Employees coveredWho is excluded from the denominator?Counselling accessIs it confidential and accessible?Programme spendingWhat was the cost per beneficiary/outcome?Annual campaignDid support continue beyond the campaign? The credibility of workplace wellbeing reporting depends on moving beyond programme availability to measurable and sustained outcomes. What Would Make Workplace Wellbeing Credible to Investors?If mental health is becoming an important part of the “S” in ESG, companies will need to show more than the existence of a counselling service or employee-assistance programme. Investors want to know who is covered, whether employees can actually access and use the support, and what evidence shows that it is making a difference. The first requirement is clear coverage. Companies should state how many workers are included in their wellbeing programmes and whether this covers only permanent employees or also contract, outsourced and gig workers. Reporting both total figures and workforce-adjusted measures can provide a clearer picture of the programme’s actual reach. Without a defined reporting boundary, percentages can create a misleading impression of scale. The second is accessibility. A programme may be officially available but difficult to use because of working hours, location, language, limited awareness or concerns about confidentiality. For blue-collar, shift and contract workers, removing these barriers can be just as important as offering the programme itself. Then comes evidence of outcomes. Companies do not need to reduce mental health to a single score, but they can track indicators such as programme use, completion, employee feedback, absenteeism and retention trends. These measures can help show whether support is reaching employees and whether workforce wellbeing is changing over time, without claiming that one programme alone caused a particular business outcome. Continuity is another important test. Mental-health support should not disappear once a wellness campaign ends or an annual budget cycle close. Credible wellbeing strategies require sustained access, regular evaluation and safe channels through which employees can share feedback. Investors and ESG-data providers can also influence this shift. Rather than rewarding companies simply for reporting that a wellbeing programme exists, they can place greater emphasis on coverage, accessibility, outcomes and transparency. The Wellbeing Measurement ChainAccess → Participation → Completion → Outcome → Continuity Credible workplace wellbeing reporting requires companies to move from simply offering support to demonstrating sustained outcomes. For companies, the message is straightforward: strong wellbeing performance is not about having the most visible wellness programme. It is about creating a workplace where employees can seek support without stigma, access it without unnecessary barriers and trust that their personal information will remain protected. The conversation is therefore moving from “We have a wellness programme” to “Here is the evidence that our workforce is better supported.” That distinction could determine whether workplace wellbeing remains another activity listed in an ESG report or becomes a meaningful indicator of how responsibly a company manages its people. Ultimately, the wellbeing section of an ESG report should measure more than the number of workshops or campaigns conducted. It should show who is covered, who receives support, what changes and whether that support lasts or not!   Evidence Check: What Should Investors Look For?  Coverage: What percentage of the total workforce is included? Utilisation: How many employees actually used the support? Outcome: What changed after the intervention? Worker mix: Are contract, blue-collar and gig workers included? Cost: How much was actually spent per beneficiary/outcome? Continuity: Did support continue beyond the campaign or funding period? Baseline: Is there a starting point against which improvement is measured? Reporting boundary: Does the data cover the whole workforce or only selected employees?      Primary sources  SEBI — BRSR Core & ESG disclosure frameworkThis is your most important source. SEBI’s BRSR Core specifically includes employee/worker wellbeing spending and says mental-health access can be part of the reported wellbeing measures. SEBI — BRSR Core framework SEBI — Updated BRSR formatUseful for your coverage/denominator argument because the framework asks companies to report employee wellbeing benefits separately for permanent and non-permanent employees. SEBI — Updated BRSR format SEBI — BRSR Core industry reporting standardsUse this when discussing how ESG disclosures are becoming more standardised and comparable. SEBI — Industry Standards on Reporting of BRSR Core Live Love Laugh Foundation — Corporate Mental Health & Well-being ProgrammeVery useful for your wellness vs measurable outcome argument. Its programme uses employee assessments, stigma-reduction measures and utilisation of existing EAPs rather than relying only on awareness events. Live Love Laugh — Corporate Mental Health & Well-being Programme Live Love Laugh Foundation — Corporate India roadmapUse its Transforming Mental Health in Corporate India: A Roadmap for Action as a sector-specific source for burnout, workplace stress and the argument that mental health should move beyond one-off initiatives. Live Love Laugh — Corporate India Roadmap NIMHANS — Centre for Well BeingGood primary institutional source for the availability of professional mental-health support and NIMHANS' broader role in mental-health services. NIMHANS Centre for Well Being NIMHANS — Institutional informationUseful for establishing NIMHANS' role in mental-health research, care, policy and national programmes. NIMHANS ...Read more

10 Aug 2026

Tribal India at 79 - The Republic's Unfinished Promise of Rights, Resilience and Renewal International Day of the World's Indigenous Peoples | 9 August 2026 They protected forests before biodiversity became policy language, practised circularity before ESG became a boardroom metric, and built community institutions long before participatory development entered textbooks. Yet tribal India has also carried a disproportionate burden of displacement, poor health, educational exclusion and loss of control over land. On the International Day of the World's Indigenous Peoples, the real question is not how to bring Adivasis into a supposedly superior mainstream, but how India can guarantee mobility without uprooting, prosperity without dispossession and modernity without cultural disappearance. Quick SummaryIndia's Scheduled Tribe population was 10.45 crore, or 8.6% of the population, in Census 2011 - still the latest completed Census benchmark used in official reporting. Globally, the ILO estimates about 476.6 million Indigenous Peoples, 6.2% of humanity. Seventy-nine years after Independence, India has an unusually extensive architecture of reservations, Scheduled Area protections, self-government, forest rights, schools, health missions and livelihood programmes. Progress is visible: ST literacy has risen, EMRS coverage has expanded and major mission-mode investments now target tribal-majority villages and Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Groups. But nutrition, health, land security, community forest rights, local decision-making and enterprise ownership remain unfinished. Ladakh shows the contemporary edge of the debate: job and domicile safeguards were strengthened in 2025, while 2026 negotiations over constitutional protection and democratic representation remain unresolved. The next tribal compact must therefore move from welfare for communities to rights, ownership and governance with them. Keywords: Scheduled Tribes, Adivasi, Indigenous Peoples, Fifth Schedule, Sixth Schedule, PESA, Forest Rights Act, Ladakh, EMRS, tribal health, tribal entrepreneurship, PM-JANMAN, Dharti Aaba, sustainability, Indigenous knowledge, Gen Z Hashtags: #WorldIndigenousPeoplesDay #TribalIndia #Adivasi #IndigenousPeoples #TribalRights #ForestRights #PESA #SixthSchedule #Ladakh #Sustainability #IndigenousKnowledge #TribalEntrepreneurship FACTS AT A GLANCE India10.45 crore ST citizens | 8.6% of population | Census 2011World476.6 million Indigenous Peoples | 6.2% of humanity | ILO estimateLiteracyST 73.4% vs overall 80.9% | PLFS 2023-24HealthST infant mortality 41.6 vs overall 35.2 per 1,000 | NFHS-5EMRS511 functional schools | 167,045 students | 728 sanctioned locationsForest Rights23.88 lakh individual + 1.21 lakh community titles by March 2025Political representation47 of 543 Lok Sabha seats reserved for STs in 2024Mission modePM-JANMAN ₹24,104 crore | Dharti Aaba/PM-JUGA about ₹79,156 crore   The real test is not whether development reaches tribal India, but whether it reaches without requiring people to surrender land, language, memory or the right to decide their own future.   A DAY OF PRIDE - AND A DAY OF RECKONING August 9 is the United Nations' International Day of the World's Indigenous Peoples, widely marked in India as Adivasi Divas or Tribal Day. The 2026 observance carries the theme 'Honouring Indigenous Midwives: Safeguarding Life and Well-being' - a useful reminder that Indigenous knowledge is not decorative heritage. It can be a living system of care, ecology, language and social trust. The statistics need precision. India's constitutional category is Scheduled Tribes, notified under Article 342; 'Adivasi' has deep social and political resonance, while 'Indigenous Peoples' is the international rights vocabulary. These categories overlap substantially but are not perfect synonyms. India has more than 700 notified ST groups, ranging from Gonds, Bhils, Santhals and Mundas to Khasi, Garo, Naga, Mizo, Toda, Dongria Kondh, Nicobarese and Ladakhi communities. There is no single tribal language, economy, religion or ecological practice. Officially, Census 2011 counted 10.45 crore Scheduled Tribe citizens - 8.6% of India. The global ILO estimate is about 476.6 million Indigenous Peoples, or 6.2% of the world's population. The frequently quoted 11% for India and 9% globally are therefore useful reminders of demographic scale, but they are higher than the principal official baselines. The deeper story is a paradox. Tribal cultures are celebrated in festivals, museums, handicraft fairs and tourism campaigns; tribal lands have simultaneously supplied minerals, timber, hydropower, infrastructure corridors and conservation landscapes. The citizen can be protected by the Republic and displaced in the name of the Republic. That contradiction is one of India's longest-running democratic tests.   79 YEARS LATER: PROGRESS, BUT NOT YET PARITY The most defensible assessment is neither despair nor triumph. It is progress with a persistent structural gap. PLFS 2023-24 data cited by the Government put ST literacy at 73.4%, compared with 80.9% for the overall population. This is a major advance over Census 2011, when ST literacy was about 59%, though the two surveys are methodologically different and should not be treated as a single uninterrupted series. Health has improved in access and institutional delivery, but the gap remains visible. NFHS-5 reported infant mortality among STs at 41.6 per 1,000 live births, compared with 35.2 for the general population. Among ST children under five, 40.9% were stunted, 23.2% wasted and 39.5% underweight, all above national levels. Geography is part of the inequality: a health centre that exists on paper is not accessible if a pregnant woman must cross a river, forest track or mountain road to reach it. Education illustrates the same two-sided reality. The National Education Society for Tribal Students currently lists 511 functional Eklavya Model Residential Schools serving 167,045 students, with 728 locations approved. Scholarships, hostels and digital access have expanded opportunity. Yet a school can still alienate if the child's first language is absent, local history appears nowhere in the curriculum, teachers rotate rapidly and achievement is defined as distance from one's own culture. Reservation remains an indispensable ladder. In all-India Central Government direct recruitment through open competition, the ST benchmark is 7.5%; seats are also reserved in legislatures and education under the constitutional and statutory framework. In the 2024 Lok Sabha, 47 of 543 seats are reserved for ST candidates. These measures have helped create generations of tribal teachers, administrators, doctors, engineers, academics, police officers, elected representatives and professionals. But reservation becomes meaningful only when a child reaches the starting line. A reserved seat cannot repair a failed primary school, and a vacancy cannot help a young person pushed out of education at 14.   LAND IS HOME, MEMORY, MARKET - AND POWER For many tribal communities, land is not merely a transferable asset. A hill may be sacred; a grove can be temple, pharmacy, watershed and community archive; a pasture may embody seasonal rights; a forest can carry food, fuel, medicine, ritual and ancestry. When such a landscape is lost, compensation per acre cannot recreate the social ecosystem that disappears with it. This is why displacement is more than moving a house. It can mean loss of common grazing, burial grounds, fishing access, sacred sites, minor forest produce, customary institutions and intergenerational ecological knowledge. It can also shift a household from subsistence security into precarious wage labour. 'Ease of doing business' in tribal territory must therefore be tested against an equally fundamental question: whose ease, whose consent and whose long-term costs? The Forest Rights Act, 2006 attempted a historic correction by recognising individual and community rights that colonial and post-colonial forest administration often failed to record. Government data up to March 2025 reported 23.88 lakh individual titles and 1.21 lakh community titles, covering about 232.66 lakh acres. That is significant. But the next frontier is community forest-resource governance, not merely individual pattas. A forest governed as a commons is institutionally different from a forest fragmented into private plots. The principle should now be rights before irreversible projects. Forest-right claims, community-resource boundaries, Gram Sabha processes, cultural impacts and rehabilitation obligations should be settled before mining, infrastructure, mass tourism or conservation restrictions lock in a new reality. Consultation cannot become a ritual held after the decision has effectively been made.   THE CONSTITUTIONAL SHIELD: STRONG ON PAPER, UNEVEN ON THE GROUND India did not leave tribal citizens constitutionally unprotected. The Fifth Schedule under Article 244(1) creates a special administrative framework for Scheduled Areas in ten states, including protections around tribal land and Tribes Advisory Councils. The Sixth Schedule under Article 244(2) goes further in specified tribal areas of Assam, Meghalaya, Tripura and Mizoram by creating Autonomous District and Regional Councils with legislative, executive, financial and certain judicial powers. PESA - the Provisions of the Panchayats (Extension to the Scheduled Areas) Act, 1996 - carried a radical democratic idea: the Gram Sabha should not be a spectator where community resources, traditions and local development are concerned. Three decades later, implementation still depends on state rules and whether mining, forest, excise, land, water and police procedures genuinely respect that authority. There has been recent movement. By 2026, nine of the ten PESA states had framed rules; the Ministry of Panchayati Raj added Jharkhand's PESA Rules 2025 to its official repository on July 27, 2026, while Odisha's rules were still being finalised. This is progress - and also evidence of how slowly a transformative law can travel from Parliament to the village meeting. The lesson is institutional: constitutional protection is not self-executing. A Gram Sabha needs legal literacy, records, funds, technical support and officials willing to treat it as a democratic authority rather than an inconvenience. The Fifth Schedule, PESA and FRA work best as a connected architecture, not as isolated files in separate departments.   LADAKH: THE NEW FRONTIER OF THE AUTONOMY DEBATE Ladakh has become the clearest contemporary illustration of the difference between welfare protection and political autonomy. When it became a Union Territory without a legislature in 2019, the National Commission for Scheduled Tribes recommended bringing Ladakh under the Sixth Schedule. The Commission noted the region's overwhelmingly tribal character and argued that constitutional devolution could protect culture, agrarian rights and local development. The Centre and Union Territory administration have since strengthened employment and domicile protections. The 2025 recruitment framework reserves 80% of direct-recruitment posts for Scheduled Tribes, 4% for residents of areas adjoining the Line of Control, 1% for Scheduled Castes and 10% for Economically Weaker Sections, leaving 5% unreserved. Domicile rules were also formalised. These measures address an important fear: that local youth could be crowded out of public employment. But Ladakh's movement has never been only about jobs. Its core demands have included statehood, stronger democratic representation, constitutional safeguards for land and culture, a public-service architecture and greater local control over an ecologically fragile high-altitude region. Violent clashes and police firing in Leh in September 2025 left four people dead, deepening mistrust. The 2026 dialogue has therefore evolved. In May and July, representatives of the Leh Apex Body and Kargil Democratic Alliance reported discussions with the Union Home Ministry around an elected territory-level democratic structure and constitutional safeguards modelled partly on Article 371-type provisions. By July 31 they were still awaiting a formal draft, and on August 7 leaders warned of renewed agitation over cases and compensation arising from the 2025 violence. The original statehood and Sixth Schedule demands have not vanished. Ladakh is now a live constitutional negotiation over how land, identity, ecology and democratic power can be secured together.   HEALTH: RESPECT KNOWLEDGE, BUT BUILD A REFERRAL CHAIN The UN's 2026 focus on Indigenous midwives makes a central point: cultural trust can determine whether modern healthcare is reached in time. Tribal communities possess extensive empirical knowledge of medicinal plants, food diversity, childbirth, seasonal disease and local ecology. The correct response is neither to romanticise every traditional remedy nor to dismiss knowledge simply because it did not originate in a laboratory. India's tribal health architecture is increasingly moving toward targeted missions. PM-JANMAN, with an outlay of ₹24,104 crore, focuses on 75 Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Group communities across 18 states and one Union Territory through housing, water, education, nutrition, health, roads, telecom and livelihoods. The National Sickle Cell Anaemia Elimination Mission targets elimination by 2047 and has prioritised screening and management in tribal and high-prevalence regions. The next step should be continuity, not camps: locally recruited health workers, mobile units linked to real referral hospitals, telemedicine where it works, reliable transport, nutrition surveillance, mental-health services and evidence-based engagement with tribal healers and midwives. A trusted community practitioner can become the first node in a safe referral chain rather than the last alternative before a crisis.   EDUCATION: GIVE THE CHILD THE WORLD WITHOUT TAKING AWAY HER WORLD The objective of tribal education should not be assimilation disguised as opportunity. A Santhal child should be able to learn artificial intelligence without being taught that Santhali is a lesser language. A Gond student should encounter global science without finding Gondi knowledge absent from every page. A Khasi or Mizo student should not have to become culturally invisible to become professionally mobile. The strongest model is multilingual in the early years, locally staffed where possible, academically ambitious and technologically enabled without becoming technology-dependent. It should place tribal history, literature, ecology, art, law and contemporary role models beside STEM, English, communication, entrepreneurship and digital skills. Elders, artisans, healers, farmers and storytellers can be knowledge partners, not museum exhibits. This is also a Gen Z question. Young tribal Indians now move between village and university, forest and city, hostel and home, local market and digital platform. The policy challenge is not to force a choice between roots and routers. It is to give young people the capability to carry both.   FROM LIVELIHOOD TO OWNERSHIP: THE ENTERPRISE QUESTION Tribal India is economically active, but too much value still leaves the producer before the product reaches the consumer. Forest-produce gatherers, farmers, pastoralists and artisans often sell raw mahua, lac, bamboo, tamarind, honey, millet, textiles or medicinal products while intermediaries capture the margin through processing, certification, packaging, finance and distribution. Van Dhan, TRIFED, minimum-support-price mechanisms, cooperatives, self-help groups and concessional finance have helped create market access and local value addition. A newer policy signal is equally important: at Dharti Aaba TribePreneurs 2025, more than 45 ST-founded startups were showcased and a ₹50-crore Venture Capital Fund for Scheduled Tribes was highlighted. That begins to expand the image of the tribal entrepreneur beyond souvenirs. The next generation should be able to found food companies, community-owned tourism platforms, design labels, media studios, logistics businesses, drone services, climate-tech ventures and AI enterprises. Ease of enterprise should mean working capital, simpler compliance, broadband, warehousing, laboratories, logistics, procurement preference, design support, intellectual-property protection and patient capital. A Gond artist should not remain the anonymous supplier while a distant company owns the brand built around Gond art. The Dharti Aaba Janjatiya Gram Utkarsh Abhiyan adds a system-level opportunity: about ₹79,156 crore, 17 ministries and 25 interventions aimed at critical gaps in tribal-majority villages. Its promise lies in convergence, because deprivation does not arrive department-wise. A malnourished girl in a village without secondary school, secure forest tenure or transport does not have four separate problems. She has one systems problem.   THE PEOPLE WHO PRACTISED SUSTAINABILITY BEFORE IT HAD A NAME Tribal communities should not be frozen into the romantic stereotype of the 'noble ecological savage'. Poverty, market pressure, population change and shortened fallow cycles can make once-resilient practices unsustainable. But many Indigenous institutions contain principles that modern climate and sustainability policy is urgently rediscovering: collective management of commons, seasonal harvesting, mixed cropping, seed diversity, repair and reuse, climate-responsive architecture, sacred groves, locally adapted food systems and knowledge of ecological indicators. The Apatani landscape of Ziro Valley is an Indian illustration. UNESCO's tentative-list documentation describes meticulous irrigation channels, wet-rice cultivation and forest conservation around the valley's watersheds, reinforced by customary rules. Sacred groves across tribal and Indigenous landscapes similarly show how culture can create de facto conservation zones long before a statutory protected-area notification. Globally, FAO notes that Indigenous Peoples manage roughly 28% of the world's land surface, including some of the most ecologically intact forest areas. Evidence from forest regions also shows a powerful relationship between secure collective tenure and lower deforestation. The lesson is not that tradition is automatically green. It is that people protect landscapes more effectively when they possess long-term rights, local knowledge and a reason to care what the ecosystem will look like two generations later. Modern science and Indigenous knowledge therefore need not behave like rivals. Satellite imagery can meet the herder's route memory. Weather forecasts can meet a farmer's reading of insects and flowering. GIS can map a watershed while villagers identify the spring that fails first in drought. Biotechnology can analyse a medicinal plant while community knowledge identifies where inquiry should begin - with benefit-sharing and consent built in.   GEN Z ADIVASI: ROOTS WITH ROUTERS The most visible transformation may be generational. A young musician can sing in a tribal language and distribute the song globally. An artisan can photograph work on a phone and sell beyond the local haat. A student can learn Python while recording oral folklore. A designer can transform inherited motifs into contemporary fashion while asking the modern legal question: who owns the design? A filmmaker can tell a community's story without waiting for an outsider to arrive with a camera. Digital life can therefore preserve as well as erode culture. It creates archives, audiences, markets and political visibility; it also accelerates language loss, algorithmic homogenisation and commercial appropriation. In the twenty-first century a community can lose something without losing an acre of land: it can lose control over its songs, motifs, medicinal knowledge, biological data or oral history. Cultural copyright, biodiversity benefit-sharing, community-controlled archives and data sovereignty should consequently become part of tribal-rights policy. The smartphone need not silence the drum. It can broadcast it - if the community retains agency over what is recorded, circulated and monetised.   WHAT THE REST OF INDIA CAN LEARN The question cannot remain only, 'What can India do for tribal communities?' It must also ask, 'What can India learn from them?' The answer is not imitation but institutional humility. Tribal and Indigenous experience can remind a hyper-individualised economy that communities are infrastructure; remind cities drowning in waste that repair and reuse were normal before disposability became a business model; remind industrial agriculture that seed diversity and seasonal foods are forms of risk management; remind climate policy that a forest is more than stored carbon; remind democracy that participation is more than voting every five years; remind architecture that climate-responsive design existed before green-building labels; and remind economics that commons can carry immense value even when they have no market price. Most importantly, many tribal worldviews refuse to separate economy, ecology, culture and social responsibility as completely as industrial modernity has done. Prosperity and possession are not identical concepts. The world does not need to 'become tribal'; it needs the humility to recognise that modern industrial systems did not invent every form of intelligence.   WHAT THE STATE MUST DO NEXT: AN EIGHT-POINT COMPACT 1. Rights before projects. Complete and transparently audit FRA claims and community forest-resource rights before irreversible mining, infrastructure, tourism or conservation decisions. Measure cultural and livelihood loss, not only land value. 2. Make PESA real. Align state land, mining, forest, water, excise and minor-forest-produce laws with PESA; give Gram Sabhas legal literacy, records, funds and technical support; complete Odisha's rules and audit implementation in every PESA state. 3. Build multilingual excellence. Recruit local-language teachers, co-create textbooks with communities, digitise languages, bring elders and artisans into classrooms, and pair cultural grounding with first-rate STEM, AI, communication and entrepreneurship. 4. Create a tribal public-health architecture. Strengthen nutrition, maternal and child health, sickle-cell screening, mental health, mobile medicine and referral networks. Engage Indigenous midwives and healers through evidence-based training and referral, not token celebration. 5. Move from livelihood to ownership. Use Van Dhan, TRIFED, concessional credit and startup funds to build producer-owned brands, processing companies, tourism enterprises and technology businesses. Add procurement, certification, logistics and patient capital. 6. Protect land, culture and digital sovereignty. Enforce safeguards against alienation and coercive transfer. Let communities determine how songs, designs, stories, medicinal knowledge, biological resources and digital data are documented and commercialised, with benefit-sharing. 7. Pay for stewardship. Route a greater share of climate finance, watershed restoration, biodiversity and community-forest budgets to Gram Sabhas and accountable local institutions. Conservation should create an economic stake for the people doing it. 8. Govern with tribal citizens. Put tribal youth, women, entrepreneurs, scholars, traditional institutions and Gram Sabhas inside programme design and evaluation. Measure success by health, learning, income, ecological security, mobility and control over the future - not merely allocations and inaugurations.   DEVELOPMENT WITHOUT DISAPPEARANCE For generations, development quietly assumed that the future would make tribal cultures less tribal: forests would give way to markets, customary institutions to formal administration, local languages to dominant ones, and young people would prove their progress by leaving inherited worlds behind. That assumption should end. A young Adivasi woman becoming a surgeon is progress; she should not have to stop speaking her language to prove it. A tribal entrepreneur building a large company is progress; the community's forest should not have to disappear for the company to exist. A highway reaching a remote settlement is progress; it should not become the road through which the settlement loses control of its land. A child learning artificial intelligence is progress; it is richer if that child also knows the songs, plant names and ecological memory of a grandmother. The goal is mobility without uprooting, prosperity without dispossession, education without cultural erasure, conservation without exclusion and modernisation without disappearance. The forest was never empty. The mountain was never empty. The island and grassland were never empty. They held knowledge systems that conventional economics often failed to count because much of their wealth was shared rather than sold. At the precise moment when humanity is searching for resilient food systems, biodiversity protection, low-carbon lifestyles and stronger communities, India's tribal worlds contain knowledge that should be engaged with - not extracted from. The Republic's task is therefore neither to freeze Adivasi citizens in a romantic past nor absorb them into a homogenised future. It is to protect the power to choose: the right to remain, the freedom to move, the opportunity to prosper, the authority to govern, the confidence to modernise and the dignity to remain themselves. That would be a far greater tribute than one commemorative day each year.   SOURCES & VERIFICATION NOTE This feature integrates the substantive themes and arguments of the uploaded 73-page working document, while reconciling duplicated drafts and updating time-sensitive claims to 10 August 2026. Census, PLFS, NFHS and programme dashboards measure different things in different years; figures are therefore labelled by source/year rather than blended into a false single timeline. Ladakh is described as an evolving negotiation, not as a settled constitutional outcome. • United Nations DESA: International Day of the World's Indigenous Peoples 2026 - theme and observance. Source • ILO: Implementing ILO Convention No. 169: estimate of 476.6 million Indigenous Peoples, 6.2% of world population. Source • Press Information Bureau / Ministry of Tribal Affairs: ST population 10.45 crore (8.6%); policy and TRIFED context. Source • Press Information Bureau: PLFS 2023-24 literacy and NFHS-5 health/nutrition comparisons for STs. Source • NESTS: Current EMRS dashboard: functional schools, students and sanctioned locations. Source • Ministry of Panchayati Raj: PESA Rules framed by states; Jharkhand Rules 2025 added July 27, 2026. Source • Press Information Bureau / NCST: 2019 NCST recommendation to include Ladakh under the Sixth Schedule. Source • Ladakh Administration: 2025 domicile and reservation framework / recruitment protections. Source • The New Indian Express: July 31, 2026 status of Ladakh negotiations on elected body and Article 371-type safeguards. Source • Press Information Bureau: PM-JANMAN scope and ₹24,104-crore outlay. Source • Press Information Bureau: Dharti Aaba Janjatiya Gram Utkarsh Abhiyan: convergence across 17 ministries and tribal-majority villages. Source • Press Information Bureau: Dharti Aaba TribePreneurs 2025 and ₹50-crore Venture Capital Fund for ST entrepreneurs. Source • Press Information Bureau: FRA progress to March 2025: individual/community titles and area vested. Source • FAO: Indigenous Peoples manage about 28% of the world's land surface and are key forest/biodiversity stakeholders. Source • UNESCO World Heritage Centre: Apatani Cultural Landscape: customary watershed conservation and irrigation in Ziro Valley. Source • Election Commission of India: 2024 Lok Sabha Atlas: 47 seats reserved for Scheduled Tribes. Source Editorial note: The phrase 'tribal' is used because it remains common in Indian law and public discourse; 'Scheduled Tribes' is the precise constitutional category, while 'Adivasi' and 'Indigenous Peoples' carry wider cultural and international meanings.   ...Read more

10 Aug 2026

Kolkata | August 7, 2026 As India strengthens its position in global supply chains, responsible sourcing has become just as important as sustainable production. While companies increasingly promote ESG commitments and ethical procurement, concerns over bonded labour, migrant-worker exploitation and weak rehabilitation continue to challenge the credibility of these claims. The real question is no longer whether businesses have policies- but whether those policies protect workers on the ground. Quick SummaryIndia's ambition to become a global manufacturing and sourcing hub is placing greater attention on labour rights across supply chains. International buyers, particularly in Europe, now expect companies to prove that products are made without forced or bonded labour, making human-rights due diligence a critical part of ESG reporting. While governments have intensified anti-bonded labour campaigns and many large companies have strengthened supplier monitoring, challenges remain in sectors such as brick kilns, quarrying, textiles and construction, where migrant workers often face debt, poor working conditions and limited access to legal protections. Experts argue that rescue operations alone are insufficient unless rehabilitation, fair wages and long-term livelihood support are ensured. As global regulations become stricter, India's competitiveness will increasingly depend not only on environmental sustainability but also on how effectively it safeguards the rights and dignity of workers throughout its supply chains. Keywords Bonded Labour, Forced Labour, Human Rights, ESG, Supply Chains, Human Rights Due Diligence, Responsible Sourcing, Migrant Workers, Labour Rights, Ethical Supply Chains, Corporate ESG, India ESG, Worker Welfare, Sustainable Business, Social Sustainability, Global Trade, EU Due Diligence, ESG Compliance, Responsible Procurement, India Labour Can India Build Global Supply Chains Without Leaving Workers Behind? India's ESG journey is no longer judged only by carbon emissions, renewable energy targets or environmental commitments. Gradually, investors, regulators and consumers around the world are asking a more fundamental question: Who made the product, and under what conditions? As global supply chains become more transparent, labour rights have emerged as one of the strongest indicators of corporate sustainability. This shift comes at a critical moment for India. As the country strengthens its position as a global manufacturing hub through initiatives such as Make in India and the Production-Linked Incentive (PLI) schemes, it is attracting companies looking to diversify their supply chains. But with this opportunity comes greater scrutiny. International buyers now expect more than quality products and competitive prices- they also want assurance that goods are produced without forced labour, child labour or exploitative working conditions. At the heart of this challenge is bonded labour, one of India's oldest and most persistent labour-rights issues. Although the practice was abolished under the Bonded Labour System (Abolition) Act, 1976, cases continue to emerge across several industries. Workers caught in cycles of debt, informal employment and labour contracting arrangements often remain trapped in exploitative conditions despite legal protections. The issue goes far beyond legal compliance. Labour rights have become a key part of ESG performance. A company may reduce emissions, invest in clean energy and publish detailed sustainability reports, but if exploitation exists anywhere within its supply chain, those achievements are seen as incomplete. For global investors and responsible businesses, environmental responsibility and human rights are now inseparable. This changing landscape is also reshaping corporate practices. Large listed companies, exporters and multinational buyers are strengthening supplier checks, conducting labour audits and integrating human-rights due diligence into their procurement processes. These measures are aimed not only at meeting international expectations but also at reducing the legal, financial and reputational risks associated with unethical supply chains. However, experts caution that stronger corporate policies alone will not eliminate the problem. A large share of India's workforce remains employed in the informal sector, where monitoring is limited and many workers have little awareness of their rights or access to effective grievance mechanisms. As India seeks to expand its role in global manufacturing and trade, ensuring that economic growth is matched by stronger labour protections has become one of the country's most pressing sustainability priorities.The Hidden Reality of Bonded Labour Despite stronger laws and growing corporate commitments, bonded labour continues to exist across parts of India. Rather than disappearing, it has become less visible, often hidden within informal employment, labour contracting systems and migrant-worker networks that receive limited oversight.Some of the highest risks of bonded labour continue to be reported in sectors such as brick kilns, stone quarries, textiles, construction and small manufacturing units. In many cases, workers are recruited through middlemen who offer advance payments or small loans. What begins as financial support can soon turn into a cycle of debt, leaving workers unable to leave their jobs until the amount is repaid- a practice widely recognised as debt bondage. Migrant workers are particularly at risk. Many travel long distances in search of work without formal contracts, proper documentation or access to social security. Language barriers, dependence on labour contractors and limited awareness of their legal rights often make it difficult for them to report exploitation or seek help. According to labour experts, these conditions can lead to unpaid wages, excessive working hours and restrictions on workers' freedom, especially in labour-intensive sectors. In response, government agencies have stepped up efforts to identify and rescue bonded labourers through district administrations and Bonded Labour Vigilance Committees. States such as Telangana have expanded inspections and rescue operations, while the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) and organisations such as International Justice Mission India (IJM India) continue to support rescue, legal action and rehabilitation. However, experts stress that rescue is only the beginning of the process. The bigger challenge is helping survivors rebuild their lives. Under the Central Sector Scheme for Rehabilitation of Bonded Labourers, rescued workers are entitled to financial assistance, skill development and livelihood support. However, implementation remains uneven across states. Delays in issuing Release Certificates, slow disbursal of rehabilitation funds and limited follow-up support often leave survivors vulnerable to returning to the same exploitative conditions. Organisations such as Aajeevika Bureau and SEWA Bharat have repeatedly pointed out that financial insecurity remains one of the biggest reasons many rescued workers return to informal employment. Without stable livelihoods, social protection and long-term support, breaking the cycle of bonded labour becomes extremely difficult. Businesses, too, are facing growing pressure to strengthen labour oversight throughout their supply chains. Companies are now expected to look beyond their immediate suppliers by scrutinising labour contractors, monitoring subcontractors and ensuring that temporary and migrant workers receive the same protections and rights as permanent employees.For many organisations, protecting labour rights is no longer just about regulatory compliance, it has become a key part of responsible business practices and long-term ESG performance. Where Labour-Risk Vulnerabilities Are Highest  Brick kilns Quarrying Textiles Construction Small Manufacturing When Human Rights Become a Trade Requirement The discussion around bonded labour is no longer confined to human rights- it has become a business priority. As global markets place greater emphasis on responsible sourcing, Indian companies are finding that labour practices now influence market access, investor confidence and brand reputation as much as product quality or pricing.A major reason for this shift is the European Union's Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (CSDDD) and other emerging international regulations. These require companies to identify, prevent and address human-rights risks across their supply chains. Global buyers are no longer satisfied with just supplier declarations. They expect evidence that workers are recruited fairly, paid properly and employed under safe and ethical conditions, particularly in sectors that have historically been linked to labour exploitation. In response, many Indian exporters and large listed companies are strengthening their human-rights due diligence processes. Supplier agreements are gradually incorporating labour-rights clauses, mandatory compliance requirements and independent audits. Businesses are also looking beyond their direct suppliers to examine labour contractors and subcontractors, where informal employment practices are often more difficult to monitor. Many companies in sectors such as manufacturing, construction, logistics and platform-based services are investing in digital worker registration, attendance systems and grievance mechanisms to improve transparency. Others are working with independent auditors and civil society organisations to assess labour conditions instead of relying solely on internal reports. These efforts are aimed not only at meeting international regulations but also at reducing legal, operational and reputational risks in an ESG-focused business environment. However, experts caution that due diligence should go beyond paperwork. Audits conducted in the presence of management, pre-announced inspections or supplier self-declarations often fail to reflect the actual conditions faced by workers. Labour-rights organisations argue that meaningful due diligence requires confidential worker interviews, regular field visits and independent grievance mechanisms that allow workers to raise concerns without fear of retaliation. The situation is particularly challenging for migrant workers employed through third-party contractors. While many companies have adopted strong ESG policies, they often have limited visibility into the working conditions of people employed beyond their direct workforce. Bridging this gap between corporate commitments and on-ground realities remains one of the biggest challenges in building truly responsible supply chains. As India strengthens its position as a global manufacturing hub, businesses are realising that long-term competitiveness will depend not only on production capacity and product quality but also on their ability to uphold human rights throughout the supply chain. For global buyers, a sustainable product begins with fair treatment of the worker long before it reaches the consumer. Progress Is Visible, But Challenges Persist Government agencies say India has made significant progress in tackling bonded labour over the past decade. Several states have stepped up rescue operations; labour inspections have become more focused and rehabilitation programmes continue to receive policy support. Authorities also point to stronger coordination between government departments, district-level vigilance committees and awareness campaigns as important steps towards identifying and protecting vulnerable workers. Businesses also highlight improvements in their labour practices. Many large listed companies now require suppliers to follow human-rights standards, conduct regular labour audits and provide grievance mechanisms for workers. ESG reporting has also broadened the focus from workplace safety to issues such as ethical recruitment, fair wages and responsible sourcing.For companies serving international markets, these measures have become essential for maintaining investor confidence and meeting global buyer expectations. However, organisations working closely with affected communities present a more cautious assessment. Groups such as Aajeevika Bureau, SEWA Bharat and International Justice Mission India (IJM India) argue that while rescue operations have improved, long-term rehabilitation remains a major challenge. Many rescued workers continue to face financial hardship, while delays in rehabilitation support, limited livelihood opportunities and difficulties in accessing government benefits often leave them vulnerable to exploitation again. Labour-rights organisations also point out that migrant workers frequently remain outside formal monitoring systems, making it difficult to identify abuse until it becomes severe. Experts also caution that corporate compliance reports do not always reflect the realities of the entire supply chain. Most audits focus on direct suppliers, while smaller subcontractors and labour contractors- where the risk of exploitation is often highest receive much less attention. Without independent worker interviews, confidential grievance mechanisms and regular field verification, important labour issues can remain hidden despite positive ESG disclosures. For this reason, many experts believe that the next stage of India's ESG journey should focus less on expanding policies and more on measuring real outcomes. The true test of progress is not the number of audits conducted or policies announced, but whether workers receive fair wages, safe working conditions, access to benefits and effective protection when their rights are violated.   Closing this gap between policy and implementation will be crucial if India has to build supply chains that meet both national labour standards and rising global expectations. From Compliance to Competitiveness Worker Rights → Responsible Supply Chains → Stronger ESG → Investor Confidence → Export Competitiveness   Why Protecting Workers Is Good for Business Labour rights are no longer seen as just a legal requirement. They have become an important measure of how companies are judged by investors, regulators and global buyers. Today, a strong ESG profile is not defined only by lower emissions or renewable energy investments- it is also shaped by how businesses treat the people working across their supply chains. This shift is changing the way companies operate. Investors are paying greater attention to labour-related risks, while international buyers expect businesses to prove that their products are made under fair and ethical working conditions. Companies that cannot demonstrate responsible recruitment, safe workplaces and effective grievance mechanisms risk damaging their reputation, losing investor confidence and facing challenges in global markets. At the same time, organisations that invest in better labour practices are discovering clear business benefits. Fair wages, transparent supply chains and safe working conditions can improve employee morale, reduce operational disruptions and build stronger relationships with customers and investors. Protecting workers is no longer just about meeting regulations- but becoming a competitive advantage. For India, this shift carries particular significance. As the country strengthen its position as a global manufacturing hub, the credibility of its supply chains will depend not only on production capacity but also on the confidence that goods are produced under fair and lawful conditions. Sustainable economic growth cannot be achieved without protecting the people who drives it. Ultimately, India's ESG journey will be judged not only by how successfully it cuts emissions or expands clean industries, but also by how effectively it safeguards the rights and dignity of its workforce. Ending bonded labour requires much more than rescue operations or compliance reports.   It demands fair wages, timely rehabilitation, secure livelihoods and supply chains where every worker is visible, protected and treated with dignity. As global markets continue to demand greater transparency, businesses that place human rights at the centre of their ESG strategies will be better positioned to earn trust, attract investment and compete internationally. In the end, India's success as a global manufacturing and sourcing destination will depend not only on what it produces, but on how well it protects the people who produce it.    Sources:  Ministry of Labour & Employment, Government of India – Bonded Labour System (Abolition) Act, labour welfare schemes and rehabilitation policies.https://labour.gov.in/ National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) – Reports and advisories on bonded labour, migrant workers and human-rights protection.https://nhrc.nic.in/ International Justice Mission (IJM) India – Bonded labour rescue, rehabilitation and survivor case studies.https://www.ijm.org/india Aajeevika Bureau – Research and policy work on migrant labour, safe migration and labour rights.https://www.aajeevika.org/ SEWA Bharat – Informal workers, women's livelihoods and labour rights.https://www.sewabharat.org/ J-PAL South Asia – Evidence-based research on labour markets, migration and public policy.https://www.povertyactionlab.org/south-asia Telangana Labour Department – State-level bonded labour rescue initiatives, inspections and rehabilitation measures.https://labour.telangana.gov.in/ Central Consumer Protection Authority (CCPA) (for broader ethical business and consumer accountability where relevant)https://consumeraffairs.nic.in/ ESIC (Employees' State Insurance Corporation) – Worker welfare, social security and benefit access.https://www.esic.gov.in/  International Labour Organization (ILO) – Global standards on forced labour, decent work and supply-chain due diligence.https://www.ilo.org/                   ...Read more