The Department of Civil Engineering of SRM University-AP conducted the second industrial visit for the Civil Engineering students of all semesters on November 30, 2022.

Details of the industrial site

An 18-kilometre stretch bridge over the Krishna River in the Chinakakani-Gollapudi highway is under construction jointly by the Adani group and Navayuga Engineering Company Limited. Hands-on practical insight was provided by experienced site Engineers on the topic of the post-tensioned precast bridge and the launching arrangement of each precast segment using advanced technological equipment. Students were also exposed to the different units of the site (i.e., the Safety class was delivered by the site officials, the Concrete batching plant, Quality control laboratories, and the Casting yard of the precast units).

Coordinating faculty: Dr Nishant Sharma and Dr Arijit Saha

The Faculty of Psychology and Economics have jointly published a paper titled “Prevalence of Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) among young adults of Kashmir” in the Q1 Journal Child Abuse & Neglect, having an impact factor of 4.863. Dr Aehsan Ahmad Dar, Assistant Professor, Department of Psychology; Dr Manzoor Hassan Malik, Assistant Professor, Department of Economics; Dr Ayesha Parveen Haroon, Lecturer, Department of Psychology; Dr Dhamodharan M, Assistant Professor, Department of Psychology have worked on interpreting the emotional constraints that are harboured among the young adults experiencing the adversities in turbulent Kashmir.

Abstract

The present study estimated the prevalence of ACEs among young adults studying in the colleges and universities of Kashmir, India. Findings disclosed that 15.4 % of the students reported high exposure to ACEs, 13.4% of the participants reported high exposure to ACEs, 26.3 % of the sample reported moderate exposure to ACEs, 33.0 % of the youth reported low exposure to ACEs and 11.8 % of the respondents reported no exposure to ACEs. The prevalence of ACEs was found to be 88.2 % (females: 82.7 % and males: 90.8 %) with a mean of 4.72 adverse events during childhood. The ACEs with the highest level of prevalence were “often or very often insulted or put down” (49.8 %), followed by “often or very often hurt physically” (47.6 %), “often or very often pushed, grabbed, or slapped” (41.6 %), “lived with a mentally ill household member” (28.3%), “touched or sexually fondled” (25.3 %),” household member being into the prison” (25.0%) and “witnessed father or mother being pushed, grabbed, slapped, or had something thrown at them” (24.0%).

Practical Implementation of the Research

The findings of the study will serve as a reliable source for healthcare professionals, policymakers and NGOs to better understand the impact of ACEs on the health and well-being of individuals. Since ACEs are associated with several immediate and long-term health hazards, therefore, necessary efforts in this direction are suggested to advocate the early targeted intervention to reduce ACEs and their impact as well as design effective measures to improve the health and well-being of young adults, thereby reducing the development of physical and mental disorders.

Collaborations

1. Prof. Sibnath Deb, Rajiv Gandhi National Institute of Youth Development, Sriperumbudur, Tamil Nadu, India.
2. Dr Manzoor Hassan Mali, Department of Economics, SRM University-AP, Andhra Pradesh, India
3. Prof. Waheeda khan, Department of Clinical Psychology, Faculty of Behavioural Sciences, Shree Guru Gobind Singh Tricentenary University, Budhera, Gurugram, Delhi-NCR, India.
4. Dr Ayesha Parveen Haroon, Department of Psychology, SRM University-AP, Andhra Pradesh, India
5. Dr Amra Ahsan, Department of Clinical Psychology, Faculty of Behavioural Sciences, Shree Guru Gobind Singh Tricentenary University, Budhera, Gurugram, Delhi-NCR, India
6. Dr Farhat Jahan, Department of Clinical Psychology, Faculty of Behavioural Sciences, Shree Guru Gobind Singh Tricentenary University, Budhera, Gurugram, Delhi-NCR, India
7. Dr Bushra Sumaiya, Faculty of Education, Shree Guru Gobind Singh Tricentenary University, Budhera, Gurugram, Delhi-NCR, India.
8. Shaheen Yawar Bhat, Department of Physiology, All India Institute of Medical Sciences, New Delhi, India.
9. Dr Dhamodharan M, Department of Psychology, SRM University-AP, Andhra Pradesh, India
10. Mohamad Qasim, Independent Researcher

The research cohort plans to study youth’s mental health and ascertain its risk and protective factors. About 19% of the world’s children live in India, which constitutes 42% of the total Indian population, and nearly half of these children are vulnerable and need care and protection. Due to various traumatic experiences, stress has increased among young people resulting in various physical and mental disorders.

The research will focus on the pathogenic (post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, anxiety, somatisation) and salutogenic (post-traumatic growth and resilience) consequences of trauma to help the youth withstand adverse experiences and develop psychological competence. The research will provide insights into the mental health of youth that would be helpful for the administration, policymakers, and other voluntary organisations to understand effective ways to devise and implement the best intervention programs for maximising mental health protective factors and minimising its risk factors.

The global population is changing drastically, increasing at an alarming rate of more than 80 million per year. This growing population has led to enormous pressure on land-use patterns and, to a greater extent, the natural ecosystems, especially water bodies. The water bodies are getting depleted considerably, and their quality is significantly deteriorating. Assistant Professor Dr Siddhanth Dash from the Department of Civil Engineering has published the paper Development of function-specific indices for assessing water quality based on the proposed modifications of the expected conflicts on existing information entropy weights in the journal Environmental Monitoring and Assessment with an impact factor of 3.307. He has collaborated with Dr Ajay S Kalamdhad, a Professor at the Department of Civil Engineering, IIT Guwahati, for the research.

Explanation in Layperson’s Terms

Waterbody contamination is attributed to a various number of reasons: primarily anthropogenic contamination, such as extensive industrial (small as well as large-scale) discharges, leaching of chemical fertilisers from the agricultural grounds, the release of toxic chemicals such as heavy metals and pesticides, and discharge of untreated sewage water from residential complexes (primary constituents being nutrients such as N, P, and K and pathogens). These depletions of the natural water systems have affected the entire aquatic ecosystem. Indexing tools have proved to be the most significant of all the techniques developed. Water quality indices (WQIs) are mathematical representations of a particular body’s water quality, providing a singular numeric denomination reflecting its health status. Specific indices are unique indices which provide information regarding the overall anthropogenic contamination and are broadly target-specific. Over the years and extensive studies carried out worldwide, while multivariate statistics have proved its reliability, the existing approach of using entropy weights suffers from various ambiguities.

Dr Dash’s study addresses vital issues relating to the existing use of entropy weights in WQIs, thus proposing a novel approach to employing information entropy in determining the water body’s health status.

Practical Implementation and Social Implication of the Research

Water quality assessment remains paramount when providing safe and potable water as per the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). This study’s results would pave the way for a more reliable and time-conserving manner of assessing water quality and a broader context and health status of a water body that will help protect and preserve different water bodies globally. The present study will also benefit the researchers and policymakers in making sustainable decisions toward restoring water bodies and preventing them from plausible future deterioration.

Working on sustainable and effective treatment techniques to remediate emerging contaminants in aquatic ecosystems is the future research plan of Dr Dash.

Abstract

Water serves numerous purposes besides drinking, such as irrigation and industrial usage. Most water quality indices developed have primarily focused on drinking water quality. However, assessing other functionalities of water bodies is also equally essential. The present study proposes a novel technique to measure water quality for two highly specific water use, i.e., assessing heavy metal contamination and irrigation suitability. The ambiguities in the current practice of entropy weights were identified, and a novel method was proposed, considering a three-dimensional approach instead of the conventional two-dimensional procedure. Weights to different parameters were assigned based on the probability estimates obtained from the frequency of observed values within acceptable limits. The proposed method’s reliability, correctness, and applicability were tested using Deepor Beel’s water quality dataset. Results were highly consistent with the experimental values and correlated well with other established methods. The efficacy of the method was determined by employing sensitivity analyses. Both indices showed high reliability and correctness, as no single parameter was found to be highly sensitive compared to others. Therefore, the proposed methodology proved to be the most reasonable, incorporating all the factors required for a reliable water quality monitoring program.

Citation of the Article

Dash, S., & Kalamdhad, A. S. (2022). Development of function-specific indices for assessing water quality based on the proposed modifications of the expected conflicts on existing information entropy weights. Environmental Monitoring and Assessment, 194(12), 1-17.

Dr Chandana Deka from the Department of Liberal Arts presented a paper titled Faith and Healing: Exploring Alternative Medicine at the international conference on Science and Philosophy in Indian Knowledge System organised by the Institute for Science and Spirituality Delhi in partnership with Noida International University IKS Division, Ministry of Education, Govt. of India from December 17 to 18, 2022. Her paper has also been published as part of conference proceedings.

Abstract

Fideism is a school of thought that gives importance to faith as against reason in matters related to religion. Fideism is defined as “the view that religious belief systems are not subject to rational evaluation” (Peterson, 2003). But matters related to religion do not confine only to the transcendental aspects of religion, it also impacts and influences the socio-cultural and ethical aspects (Durkheim, 1912). In this paper, the researcher discusses one such socio-cultural aspect of religious faith, that is, religious healing. Faith-based healing is often considered one form of alternative medicine (Andrew Village, 2005). In this paper, she explores this faith-based healing and contends that not all forms of faith-based healing can be appropriated. She tries to give a theoretical justification as to which forms of faith-based healing can be adopted and which need not be. The research is analytical and critical in nature based on materials that include books and articles written on fideism and different religious Texts.

Under the ambit of the CXO Eminent Speakers’ Series, Paari School of Business organised the first virtual guest session on December 13, 2022. Mr Deepak Gupta, Country Head, Zotac Limited, Mumbai, a leading gaming enterprise, addressed the students of BBA and MBA programmes. The theme of his talk was “Global Business Scenarios: Q & A”. Given the unprecedented global changes and business transformation, Mr Gupta shared insights about how businesses are increasingly coping with emerging technological changes and innovations. From disruptive supply chain to strategic human capability, from consumer insights to finance and investing to digital leadership fronts, all demanding significant attention, and advancements for growth and sustainability for the planet, people, and profit. The session was well received by the students and faculty members.