Ashwani Kumar

The quality of democracy is defined by the stature of leaders and the vigil of citizens

What is missing is not expression, but ownership of ideas “The sacrifice of dissent is without doubt the death of politics, the sacrifice of a concurring but dissenting assent is the pathway to such imminent death”

The recent West Bengal Assembly election signals the dramatic unravelling of yet another dominant regional political party in India.

Abstract The opencast coal mining operations have a significant negative impact on land use/land cover (LULC) patterns. In this context, remote sensing (RS) and Geographic Information Systems (GIS) are notable geospatial approaches for analysing the dynamic process of land use. The study examined changes in the nearby LULC dynamics throughout a 29-year time frame, encompassing 1990–2019. The different LULC classes, such as built-up area, mining area, forest/hilly area, cropland, water body/river, and fallow land, were extracted using ArcGIS and ERDAS Imagine software in the study region. The changes in the LULC classes have been identified on the 9-year and 10-year interval using time-series Landsat imagery (1900, 2000, 2009, and 2019) with 30 m spatial resolution. The findings of this research using classified Landsat satellite imagery identified that the built-up area has increased from 0.71% (1990) to 2.07% (2019), while the mining area has increased from 4.39% (1990) to 19.88% (2019), respectively. Whereas, forest/hilly area has shown a drastic decrease of 25.75% (1990) to 16.13% (2019), indicating deforestation in the designated area. Additionally, the cropland and water body/river were also increased from 30.34% to 33.66% and 0.92% to 1.79% from 1990 and 2019, respectively. Meanwhile, the fallow land has also decreased from 37.86% (1990) to 26.43% (2019) attributed to the expansion and diversification of coal mining operations in the study region. The accuracy assessment was also performed using Koppa Coefficient and overall accuracy for each LULC map. The LULC classification was highly accurate, with overall accuracy rates of 83.64%, 86.10%, 91.20%, and 92.10% with kappa values of 0.82, 0.83, 0.89, and 0.90 for 1990, 2000, 2009, and 2019, respectively. Over the past three decades, this research area has experienced massive transformations to LULC, primarily due to the explosive expansion of coal extraction and industrial operations. These findings may provide useful information for future environmental protection and sustainable development at Singrauli coalfield region. Research highlights The present article examined the change analysis of land use/land cover (LULC) in Singrauli coalfield for a time span of 29 years by using remote sensing and GIS techniques. The result indicates that, the mining region gradually increased from 4.39% in 1990 to 19.88% in 2019, whereas fallow land decreased from 37.86% in 1990 to 26.43% in 2019. This decrease could be possible due to rapid growth of coal mining and industrial activities in the study region. The findings may provide useful information for future environmental protection and sustainable development at Singrauli coalfield area.

Defections and strategic alliances are not new to Indian politics

Defections and strategic alliances are not new to Indian politics

Democracy often rests on the idea that citizens are political equals. They may be associated with different social organisations and ideological traditions, but in the democratic culture, they interact as citizens with equal rights and equal opportunity. In a democracy, devotion was never expected; ...

DITEC's Internship 2.0 offers engineering students hands-on exposure to AI, digital governance, cyber security and public technology, preparing them for careers in India's rapidly evolving GovTech ecosystem.

In his birth centenary year, Ritwik Ghatak's works illuminate not just the psychological rupture of 1947, but also the exile, displacement & loss through which Bengal continues to imagine itself

In his birth centenary year, Ritwik Ghatak's works illuminate not just the psychological rupture of 1947, but also the exile, displacement & loss through which Bengal continues to imagine itself