| Indus Waters and Social Change |
| The Evolution and Transition of Agrarian Society in Pakistan |
| Saiyid Ali Naqvi |
| Readership / Level |
| Scholars and students of economic development especially in agriculture in Pakistan, South Asia, and in complex river basins in Asia. |
| Description |
| Saiyid Ali Naqvi has brought a wealth of knowledge in water resources development, acquired over a 58-year career, to this study of the impact of the harnessing of the Indus waters on the evolution and development of the fabric of society in the region. He follows the Indus in its journey from around 7000 bc to present times, as he develops his thesis that the processes of social change in the region that now constitutes Pakistan are inextricably linked to the harnessing of the Indus waters.
At its inception in 1947, Pakistan, with 85 per cent of its population dependent on agriculture, was an agrarian country. Today, with two-thirds of its population still living in villages, the country remains dependent on agriculture. Despite the use of machinery by big landowners, the agrarian social structure remains fettered by quasi-feudal and tribal customs. The book makes a critical assessment of the pace of the social change process in Pakistan and finds that it has reached a phase which could at best be characterized as ‘quasi-industrial’. This disappointing situation is due to the slow pace of industrialization of the agriculture sector. The book provides the research, historical facts, and insights for an informed public debate on the policy measures for overcoming impediments and accelerating the social change process. |
| About the Author / Editor |
| Saiyid Ali Naqvi was born in 1931 in Amroha, UP. After obtaining a graduate degree in civil engineering from Aligarh Muslim University, he moved to Pakistan where he commenced his career with the Pakistan government’s Central Engineering Authority (CEA). Naqvi received field training in the United States and also attended Irrigation Science classes at the Davis Campus of the University of California. In 1956, he was appointed Deputy Pakistan Irrigation Commissioner in the office of the Pakistan Irrigation Commission at Lahore which oversaw the implementation of the interim agreements between India and Pakistan on sharing the waters of the Indus rivers. He was subsequently transferred to the Water Development Organization, established by the government, to provide back-up support to the Pakistan delegation at the Indus Basin Treaty negotiations in progress under the aegis of the World Bank. Following the signing of the treaty in 1960, Saiyid Ali Naqvi began a nearly nineteen-year period of his career devoted to large dams. He held senior executive positions under the Water and Power Development Authority (WAPDA) in relation to the Mangla Dam, Tarbela Dam, and Kalabagh Dam (at project planning stage). Saiyid Ali Naqvi’s lengthy career in water resources development and management covered the large dams and irrigation projects in Pakistan and has additionally included major international projects. In 1980, he joined the Asian Development Bank (ADB) at Manila where he worked on a number of water resources and rural development projects in the Philippines, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Laos, Vietnam, China, Indonesia, and Pakistan. He has been a Member of the American Society of Civil Engineers. In addition to authoring numerous articles on water resources issues, Saiyid Ali Naqvi is devoted to Urdu and Persian poetry. Among other expressions of his poetic interests, he has written papers and articles on Ghalib and Iqbal. He is compiling a set of his own Urdu poetry for publication at a later date. A cousin of Sadequain, he has also shared the thoughts and passions of this great artist. |
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What sort of comments we are looking when we don’t have the book/research paper mentioned above.it contains more on writer’s biography than the actual content of the issue………..anyone have this book please have it available to the associates.thanks.