A couple of days ago, the BBC’s HardTalk featured a stimulating, informative, and combative interview with Sunita Narain , the Director of the Centre for Science and Environment, one of India’s leading environmnetal NGOs, which was founded by the late Anil Agarwal.
Sunita Narain is an acclaimed scholar and award-winning activist, and she touched upon a number of issues during the course of the interview: the need for India to balance considerations of rapid economic growth with good environmental policies; the approach India should take towards nuclear energy; the crisis in relation to provision of water and problems with privatising the supply of water, etc.
Despite the interviewer’s often hostile interventions, she was impressive for her ability to focus on the overall themes of her argument without being sidelined, and made her case with unusual eloquence and clarity. Academic-activists are beginning to carve out a space for themselves in public spaces in India ( recall the recent post on this blog about Bina Agarwal’s contribution to the reform of the Hindu Succession Act).
The website of the programme carries a link to a video of the interview (originally broadcast on Nov 09) which may be available for a few more days – catch it while its still available!
