April 2019

Dear Friend,

The Institute of Chinese Studies (ICS) conducted a wide range of events and activities on China and East Asia while also bringing out a number of publications in the month of April.

EVENTS AND ACTIVITIEs

ICS hosted the VP Dutt Memorial Lecture, by Prof. Prasenjit Duara on The Art of Convergent Comparisons: India and China in Modern Times. On 5 April, the ICS held a roundtable discussion on Chinese engagement in Africa in partnership with Nehru Memorial Museum and Library, wherein ICS Research Associate, Dr. Veda Vaidyanathan and her research team disseminated findings of their research project, including the fieldwork in Kenya and Tanzania. During intensive discussions that followed, they received valuable inputs for the final project report. We also organized another roundtable discussion on the Second Session of the National People’s Congress (YouTube) which included presentations from Prof. Biswajit Dhar, Centre for Economic Studies and Planning, Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU), Dr. Hemant Adlakha, Honorary Fellow, ICS and Associate Professor, Centre for Chinese and Southeast Asian Studies, JNU and Dr. P K Anand, Research Associate, ICS. Prof. Manoranjan Mohanty, Honorary Fellow, ICS and Prof. Alka Acharya, Honorary Fellow, ICS and Professor, Centre for East Asian Studies, JNU were discussants.

We conducted two Wednesday Seminars this month – on China’s Bullet Trains by Mr. Kyle Chan, PhD scholar, Department of Sociology, Princeton University, USA; and China-Myanmar Relations under Xi Jinping: A Critical Assessment by Dr. Puyam Rakesh Singh, Research Fellow, Indian Council of World Affairs, New Delhi.

PUBLICATIONS

We published one ICS Occasional Paper this month entitled ‘Land, People and Faith: Wang Meng’s Narrative of Uyghur Life in Zhe bian fengjing’ by ICS Visiting Fellow, Dr. Debasish Chaudhuri.

Three ICS Analyses were published this month - Amb. Vishnu Prakash wrote on the ‘Prospects of a US-DPRK Rapprochement & Japanese Concerns’; ICS Research Associate, Dr. Veda Vaidyanathan, explored ‘The Curious Case of the BRI Shapeshifting in Africa; and ICS Visiting Research Associate, Dr. Barnali Chanda published ‘Travel as a Metaphor: A Short Introduction to the Travelogues on China Written in Bengali’.

ICS Research Intern, Ms. Vidushi R Singh, published a piece on the ICS Blog titled ‘Chinese Steel Industry: How Did the World’s Largest Steel Producer Protect Itself from Global Slowdown and a Trade War?

IN THE MEDIA

ICS Research Associate, Dr. Gunjan Singh wrote a piece entitled ‘Does Data Tell everything about Tibet?’ for the Vivekananda International Foundation. The piece was translated and published by ORF Marathi. ICS Visiting Associate Fellow, Dr. Shamshad Ahmed Khan, was cited in an article of the Press Trust of India on the first Indian-origin Japanese person to win a local election in Japan. Our Research Assistant, Mr. Uday Khanapurkar wrote a piece for South Asian Voices on the bilateral trade deficit between India and China.

Faculty Updates

ICS Chairperson, Prof. Patricia Uberoi, made a presentation at a roundtable discussion titled ‘Random Reflections on the History of ICWA’ on 30 April at the Indian Council of World Affairs (Chair: Prof. Manoranjan Mohanty, Honorary Fellow, ICS). ICS Honorary Fellow, Col. Virendra Sahai Verma, presented a paper, ‘Aksai-Chin: A Catalyst for a Resolution of Sino-indian Border Dispute', at the Institute of Contemporary Chinese Studies, School of International Relations, Mahatma Gandhi University, Kottayam, Kerala. I delivered a lecture at IIT Madras on ‘China’s Belt & Road Initiative: Drivers, Implementation and Assessment’ on 11 April.

ICS Research Associate, Dr. Veda Vaidyanathan, presented a paper titled 'Reimagining Engagement and Realigning Priorities: How India and China are Informing the African Growth Story?' at an International Conference on the 'Past, Present and Future of African - Asian Relations' at the University of Neuchatel in Switzerland from 25-27 April. She was awarded the World Society Foundation Award for her paper.

 

The ICS Website, Facebook and Twitter accounts are among the several ways you can get the latest on our publications and activities. You can also subscribe our monthly newsletter to follow our events and publications as well as browse our YouTube and SoundCloud channels.

We look forward to seeing you at more of our events.

 
 
 

Best Regards,
ASHOK K. KANTHA
Director
Institute of Chinese Studies

 

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