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The purpose of this study is to estimate the cost of seismic resilience of identified vulnerable lifeline public buildings in earthquake-prone Himalayan province of Uttarakhand in India.

Built area of the identified vulnerable lifeline buildings together with prevalent rate of construction has been considered for assessing the cost of seismic resilience while improvised rapid visual screening (RVS) technique, better suited to the built environment in the region, has been used for assessing seismic vulnerability.

Investment of US$250.08m is assessed as being required for ensuring seismic safety of 56.3, 62.1, 52.9, 64.6, 71.9 and 61.7% surveyed buildings, respectively, of fire and emergency services, police, health, education, local administration and other departments that are to become non-functional after an earthquake and result in a major socio-political turmoil. A total amount of US$467.71m is estimated as being required for making all the buildings of these departments seismically resilient.

Actual investment estimates and reconstruction/retrofitting plans have to be prepared after detailed investigations as RVS technique only provides a preliminary estimate and helps in prioritising buildings for detailed investigations.

This study is intended to provide a snapshot of the state of seismic vulnerability together with the financial resources required for corrective measures. This is to help the authorities in planning phased mobilisation of financial and technical resources for making the built environment seismically resilient.

This study is to bring forth awareness on this important issue and consequent public opinion in favour of safety of public facilities to ensure allocation of appropriate financial resources together with changes in techno-legal regime for the cause of earthquake safety. At the same time, this study is to motivate masses to voluntarily assess safety of their neighbourhood and undertake corrective measures.

This study is based on primary data collected by the authors.

Despite being located in earthquake sensitive region and often experiencing seismic tremors the State of Uttarakhand in the Indian Himalayas exhibits an elaborate tradition of constructing multistoreyed houses. Both the local dialects of the State (Kumaoni and Garhwali) have unique words for identifying four different floors of a building. This is suggestive of a common occurrence of multistoreyed structures in the region. This paper attempts to establish that the people inhabiting this rugged earthquake prone terrain have evolved the art of constructing earthquake safe structures well before the evolution of the structural engineering principles governing such a construction.

Detailed investigations were undertaken in the area to establish the antiquity of the traditional structures, as were also earthquake safety provisions incorporated traditionally in these. Radiocarbon dating of the wood used in the structures was used to establish the time of the construction of these structures.

Investigations suggest that the region has evolved a distinct, elaborate and magnificent earthquake‐safe construction style. This construction style, designated Koti Banal architecture, attained its zenith around 880 years ago. This architectural style exhibits the existence of elaborate procedures for site selection, preparing the platform for raising the multistoreyed structure, also for the detail of the entire structure that was constructed on principles somewhat akin to that of framed structures of modern times.

The representative structures of this architecture are observed to be deteriorating fast due to lack of patronage, resources and awareness. This article brings forth awareness regarding the heritage value of these structures, enabling organized efforts for the conservation and upkeep of these structures.

This article is the result of original research undertaken by the authors and paves the way for the conservation of the age old traditional structures.

The purpose of this paper is to attempt to assess the seismic vulnerability of the built environment in the Himalayan township of Mussoorie in the state of Uttarakhand (India), paying specific attention to hospitals. Also an attempt is made to assess the magnitude of minimum economic losses, so as to design and undertake measures for reducing human misery in the event of a major disaster.

Seismic vulnerability of the building stock is evaluated using FEMA technique rapid visual screening and the likely earthquake induced damage is depicted as a function of the damage grades of the European Macroseismic Scale (EMS‐98). In total, 3,344 buildings, including 14 hospitals, are surveyed. In the field the structures are mapped using IKONOS satellite imagery while the collected data are analysed under geographic information system environment.

It was found that 18 percent of surveyed structures fall in high probability of Grade 5 damage and very high probability of Grade 4 damage class. This is estimated to result in economic loss of US$52.47 million. Almost, 80 percent of the hospitals of Mussoorie are thus likely to be non‐functional in the post‐earthquake phase due to varying degrees of structural and non‐structural damage.

The study does not account for the cost of demolition or ground clearance cost for reconstruction, or losses likely to be incurred by public infrastructure. Thus, it is implied that retrofitting and replacement of vulnerable healthcare infrastructure should be facilitated on a priority basis along with development of suitable plans for mitigating losses in an earthquake event.

The study brings forth the importance of corrective actions (retrofitting/replacement) and detailed vulnerability assessment of all lifeline structures on priority basis.

The results are intended to reduce seismic vulnerability and human toll in the event of any earthquake in the area.

The work is based upon the original data generated by the authors through rigorous fieldwork in the area and the results are totally based on these.

This study aims to add to the current understanding of mediation and moderation processes through which employee career orientation (CO) is linked with organizational citizenship behavior (OCB).

Data were collected from 214 employees working in Delhi and NCR of India. Structural equation modeling (SEM) was used for testing moderated mediation and establishing linkages between CO, CMP and OCB. Drawing on the social exchange theory, our model posits that the effect of CO on the outcome variable OCB is mediated by career management practices (CMPs) and the CMP-mediated relationship between the two is moderated by the gender of employees.

Overall, data from 214 employees from service organizations in India support the model. This suggests that the enactment of OCB as a consequence of CO and OCB is largely dependent on the gender of employees. The relationship was observed in such a way that for women employees, CMP will have a stronger influence on the CO-OCB relationship. According to bootstrap results, upon the addition of CMP as a mediator, the main effect of CO on OCB among male employees was significant but dropped from the Beta value of 0.281 to 0.196. However, adding CMP as a mediator among women employees caused the CO-OCB relationship to become insignificant (Beta = 0.124; LLCI = 0.415; ULCI = −0.127; p = 0.420), highlighting that CMP would have a more substantial influence on the CO-OCB relationship.

This study explains the mediational role of CMP in the relationship between CO and OCB (explaining how the employees with new CO can trigger the role of CMP, and consequently, CMP can help them enact OCB) and how the gender of employees moderate the mediated impact of CMP in the relationship between CO and OCB (explaining how the mediated relationship varies across genders). The novelty of the study lies in exploring such a relationship that has not been studied so far.

The purpose of this paper is to review the nature and extent of foodborne diseases in India due to chemical and microbial agents.

The scientific investigations/reports on outbreak of foodborne diseases in India for the past 29 (1980‐2009) years due to adulteration, chemical, and microbiological contamination have been reviewed. Reported scientific information on foodborne pathogens detected and quantified in Indian foods has also been reviewed.

A total of 37 outbreaks involving 3,485 persons who have been affected due to food poisoning have been reported in India. Although the common forms of foodborne diseases are those due to bacterial contamination of foods, however, higher numbers of deaths have been observed due to chemical contaminants in foods.

A national foodborne disease surveillance system needs to be developed in India in order to enable effective detection, control and prevention of foodborne disease outbreaks.

Agriculture sectors in China and India are going through rapid changes. There is a shift in demand pattern, significant changes in the supply chain, greater competition due to opening up of the domestic and external markets and fuller integration with rest of the economy. These developments have impacted traditional agriculture and its institutional underpinning. Latter are being transformed and new institutions are coming into existence. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

This paper discusses the changes in economy and the agricultural sector, explores institutional responses in terms of various producer organizations in the two countries, and examines their adequacy for the coming phase of agricultural development in China and India.

The co-existence of various farmer organizations will sustain for a long period in both China and India. Overall, they have benefitted agriculture producers, and more particularly the surplus generating farmers. However, the incompatibility between these and the vast and growing small farm sector is not disappearing. Next set of institutional reforms should address this critical question of “reaching the unreached.”

China and India are the world’s two largest countries in terms of population as well as agricultural population. They share a lot of common features. This paper discusses the changes in agricultural sector, explores institutional responses in terms of farmer organizations, and examines their adequacy for the coming phase of agricultural development in China and India, which has never been seen before.