* CRISIL Infrastructure Advisory
‘incorporates’ research findings of a VNIT professor on Urban Heat
Island effect, but deprives him of due credit
* The instance raises questions about genuineness of analysis purportedly done by the consultancy firm
* It also highlights how genuine researchers with data useful for urban
planning have been omitted from the process of revising the CDP for
Nagpur
By Kartik Lokhande
Good artists copy, great artists steal.
This
quote of legendary Pablo Picasso describes aptly how the draft of
revised City Development Plan (CDP) for Nagpur appears to have been
prepared.
A shocking instance has come to fore that the consultancy
firm CRISIL Infrastructure Advisory has ‘appropriated’ the research
findings of a city-based professor in the draft report, and has
‘incorporated’ as its own the findings as ‘observations’ on Urban Heat
Island (UHI) effect analysis.
The original research was conducted by
Yashwant Bhasker Katpatal, Professor, Department of Civil Engineering,
Visvesvaraya National Institute of Technology (VNIT); Abhijeet Kute, and
Deepty Ranjan Satapathy. Then, Kute was Research Student with School of
Geosciences at the University of Edinburgh (UK); and Satapathy was Tech
Group III (1), Environmental Systems Design and Modeling Division,
National Environmental Engineering Research Institute (NEERI).
The
study titled ‘Surface and Air Temperature Studies in Relation to Land
Use/Land Cover of Nagpur Urban Area Using Landsat 5 TM Data’ was
published in American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) Journal of Urban
Planning and Development in Septemmber 2008.
There are too many
things to be dismissed merely as ‘striking similarities. For instance,
the original research explains certain characteristics of Nagpur under
the head ‘Study Area’. And, the draft CDP carries these details mostly
verbatim on Page-171.
At least five of the six characteristics from
original research have been reproduced on Page-171. It goes on like
this: The city ‘does not show vertical growth but is recording a rapid
horizontal ‘radial’ growth. Nagpur is 310 m above mean sea level with
large, open spaces covered with vegetation. It is not a traditional
business districts, does not have heavy industrial activities, and is
dominated by the presence of residential areas. The city of Nagpur is
developed on basaltic rocks and black cotton soil. Vegetation present in
the city is totally concentrated in the western part of the region,
whereas the eastern part is densely built up.’ Barring the addition of
two words ‘urban sprawl’ in brackets at the end of the first sentence,
and replacing the word industrial ‘activity’ with ‘activities’, the
draft CDP reproduces each of these words in the same sequence from the
original research paper.
But, it does not stop here. At least two
images from the original paper also have been ‘appropriated’ by CRISIL
Infrastructure Advisory. One is a map explaining classification of Land
Use (LU)/Land Cover (LC) based upon vegetation and built up land
percentage. With legends, the same map has been used in draft CDP
without quoting the source. Another is an image that explains surface
representation of air temperature in degree Celsius. This image actually
shows with legends the ‘Heat Sink’ and ‘Heat Island’, in the original
research paper. While ‘appropriating’ this unique-to-the-research image,
the only thing that the consultancy firm has done is use the image
without legends. Again, source has not been quoted.
The most
shocking thing, which may fit the definition of plagiarism of
intellectual property of researchers, is that the draft CDP prepared by
CRISIL Infrastructure Advisory carries in verbatim the entire set of
summary of analysis of UHI effect in Nagpur city. All five research
findings from the original research paper have been ‘copied’ and
‘pasted’ almost completely in the draft CDP without quoting source of
the same.
These five findings ‘appropriated’ almost completely in
draft CDP are as follows: “Certain LU/LC classes like vegetation and
water bodies show lower temperatures, as expected. The mostly densely
populated urban areas in east Nagpur (Mahal, Itwari, Central Avenue
Road, Sitabuldi, etc) fall within high temperature zones. Interestingly
enough, the transportation network within the city (Ring Road, national
highway within the city) show high temperature zones. Some open spaces
close to the city, which are mostly barren land/wasteland or stony waste
(with Basaltic composition) at certain places, surrrounding the Nagpur
urban area also show somewhat higher temperature zones. This may be
attributed to very high heat absorption capacity of dark-collared
Basaltic rock types. Areas having very dense vegetation show low
temperature zones.”
Still, one must appreciate CRISIL Infrastructure
Advisory for making a few ‘smart’ changes. For instance, it has changed
to ‘Sitabuldi’ the word ‘Buldi’ used in original research. Further, it
has cut short a couple of sentences that had technical details. And, it
has replaced the word ‘dark-colored’ in original research paper to
‘dark-collared’ in draft CDP.
This ‘copy-paste’ job done by CRISIL
Infrastructure Advisory without acknowledging the original researchers,
raises questions over genuineness of other datasets and analyses used in
draft CDP. Besides, it also raises an important question -- If this is
what consultancy firm does, why does the Government or NMC pay it? Also,
this raises questions over the intentions behind first delaying the
process of CDP consultations and then rushing it through. It remains to
be seen if NMC becomes a party to this crime or takes corrective and
penal action, to set right the entire process of consultations for
CDP-II.
Now, it is for the NMC and the authorities concerned to
decide if those preparing the draft CDP document are ‘good’ or ‘great’
artists as described by Pablo Picasso.
CDP-II: The fraud called stakeholders’ consultations
CDP
for Nagpur was prepared last in 2006. A couple of years ago, the
process for revising CDP or formulating CDP-II gained some momentum.
Nagpur Municipal Corporation (NMC), in collaboration with the
consultancy firm CRISIL Infrastructure Advisory, tried initially to keep
away stakeholders. ‘The Hitavada’ took it upon itself to explain to the
Nagpurians various stages of stakeholders’ consultations, norms laid
down by Ministry of Urban Development, and various issues that needed to
be covered in the consultation process.
Such was the ‘effort’ of
NMC and consultant that instead of CDP-II draft, only a power-point
presentation and a feedback form were available on NMC’s website for a
few months. The draft of CDP-II was not available to common citizens.
And, this gave the vested interests in NMC scope for inviting only the
‘chosen few’ as representatives of various stakeholder groups for
consultations and show that procedure was followed.
Later on, in
2014, citing the reason that Model Code of Conduct for Lok Sabha and
Legislative Assembly elections were in force, vested interests in NMC
granted extra time to the consultancy firm to prepare draft of revised
CDP. Despite this, CRISIL Infrastructure Advisory could come up with the
draft of revised CDP in January 2015, and NMC uploaded it on its
website in February 2015.
A few days ago, NMC and CRISIL
Infrastructure Advisory conducted a workshop on CDP-II. The
stakeholders, who were present in better numbers now, alleged that the
local body had failed in resolving old burning issues of the city and
citizens were reeling under heavy tax burden. They also pointed out
which areas were left out, and stressed on educating the citizens on
revised CDP process. However, the administration turned down the
suggestion of reaching out to stakeholders for better clarity on
preparing revised CDP.
(Filed on March 19, 2015)
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