Population, Sanitation and Health: A Geographical Study Towards Sustainability

This book provides analyses of sanitation, health, population dynamics and demographic variables from different perspectives, including data science, statistics, modeling, economics and natural sciences, to inform sustainable decision making and policies related public health and hygiene and in mainly rural and impoverished areas. The structure is arranged into three broad sections: Part I, Population Dynamics, Environment and Society; Part II, Health, Livelihood and Policy Response; and Part III, Water, Sanitation, and Hygiene (WASH). The book makes recommendations for policymakers on designing and delivering social protection policies to deal with different aspects of water, health, sanitation, population, and hygiene, taking the needs of women and rural communities into special consideration. It also aims to educate students and early career researchers, to help them develop novel approaches for sustainability with environmentally sound practices.

Dr. Asraful Alam is an Assistant Professor and HoD at the Department of Geography, Serampore Girls’ College, University of Calcutta, West Bengal, India. He received his M.A. & Ph.D. degrees in Geography from Aligarh Muslim University, Aligarh and Aliah University, Kolkata, India respectively and also completed PG Diploma in Remote Sensing & GIS. Dr. Alam completes his Post Doctorate (PDF) from Department of Geography, University of Calcutta, Kolkata, India. Earlier he was an Assistant Coordinator in PG Department of Geography, Calcutta Women’s College, University of Calcutta, Kolkata, India.  His research interests include Population Geography, Agricultural Geography, Climatology, Health Geography and Remote Sensing & GIS and Developmental Studies. He has contributed various research papers published in various reputed national and international journals and edited book volumes. He has authored jointly edited books entitled “Habitat, Ecology and Ekistics: Case Studies of Human-Environment Interactions in India”, “Agriculture, Food and Nutrition Security: Case Study of Availability and Sustainability in India”, “Agriculture, Environment and Sustainable Development:  - Experiences and Case Studies”, “Life and Living through Newer Spectrum of Geography, Self-Reliance (Atmanirbhar) and Sustainable Resource Management in India”, and  Climate Change, Agriculture and Society - Approaches toward Sustainability”. He was a convener in the National Seminar on Self- reliance (Atmanirbhar), Sustainable Development and Environment 25^th& 26^th March 2022 Sponsored by Indian Council of Social Science Research (ICSSR) organized by Department of Geography, Serampore Girls’ College.  Dr. Alam has served as an Editorial Board Member in peer-reviewed International Journal of PLOS One, Earth Science, Scientific Journal of Health Science Research and Frontiers in Geochemistry.

Dr. Rukhsana is an Assistant Professor and former Head of the Department of Geography at Aliah University, Kolkata. She has twelve years of teaching as well as research experience. She obtained her M.A., Ph.D. degrees in Geography from Aligarh Muslims University. She was awarded nine academic awards and fellowships like International Young Geographer Award 2009, the AMU-JRF award 2006-07, and UGC-RF 2007-2009 award, etc. She has published more than forty papers at the national as well as international levels in reputed journals and twenty-three chapters in edited books. Dr Rukhsana has published six books and presented a no of research papers at the national and international levels. She has attended XXV FIG International Congress 2014, Malaysia and ICGGS-2018, Thailand Bangkok. Dr Rukhsana has successfully completed one major research project sponsored by ICSSR, Ministry of Education, New Delhi in the agriculture field. Four Ph.D. has been successfully awarded under her supervision. She has served as a reviewer for many reputed international journals. Her specialization in research is agriculture development and planning, urban expansion and planning, environment, rural development, RS, and GIS. She has completed various training, workshop from different organizations, and a no of training courses done by IIRS Indian Institute of Remote Sensing, ISRO, Department of Space, Govt. of India. She is engaged in various professional activities and served the university in various posts. Presently she is working as project director on a major research project sponsored by ICSSR New Delhi, India.

Dr. Nazrul Islam has been serving as an Associate Professor of Geography and HoD at Cooch Behar Panchanan Barma University, Cooch Behar, West Bengal, India. Presently he is the Head of the Department at the said University. He did his Undergraduate (B.Sc.) and Master's (M.Sc.) at Calcutta University in Geography. He was awarded a National Scholarship for his academic excellence at the undergraduate level. He did his Ph.D. at the University of North Bengal. He has participated in many International and National level seminars/conferences (s) and has published research articles in reputed Journals and chapters in edited volumes. Dr. Islam has co-authored four edited books. He has participated in various training on RS and GIS from IIRS, Dehradun, DST, Kolkata, and different Universities in India. He has visited three foreign countries, Bangladesh, Thailand, and Vietnam, to attend International conferences. His areas of interest include Cartography, Environmental, and Industrial Geography. He has ample knowledge of GIS and Remote Sensing and the application of MCDM & Machine learning in Geography. He taught his students Google Earth Engine, Python, SPSS, and R.

Dr. Bappa Sarkar, Assistant Professor of Geography and HoD at Dinhata College, Cooch Behar, has completed his graduation from Cooch Behar in 2007 and secured 1st class 1st in Geography. He completed his master's degree (2009) from the Department of Geography and Applied Geography, NBU, with 1st class 2nd. He was awarded a National Scholarship for his academic excellence. He completed his Ph.D from University of North Bengal in 2018. He has participated in various RS and GIS professional training from NRSC, Hyderabad and, IIRS, Dehradun. He has participated in many National and International seminars and Published 5 articles in National and 6 International Journals (till March 2023). He edited one Book entitled “Trends in Bio-Geography-Eastern Himalaya and North Bengal”  His area of interest includes Cartography, RS & GIS and Agricultural Geography.

Prof. Ranjan Roy is a well-known academician in Geography in west Bengal as well as in India and is a Professor and former HoD at the department of Geography and Applied Geography of University of North Bengal, Siliguri, India. He received his M.Sc. and Ph.D degree in Geography and Applied Geography from the University of North Bengal and specialized in Cartography. His research interests are in Applied Cartographic techniques, Agricultural Geography, Urban Geography, Population problems, Rural Development, Regional Planning and experts in Remote Sensing and GIS. Prof. Roy has already published over ninety (90) articles in different reputed national and international journals and edited books. He has organized different national seminars and workshops till now. Prof. Roy has supervised a total of ten (10) scholars for Ph.D degree and six (06) scholars for M.Phil degree. He was co-investigator in “Preparation of contour map for drainage management in English Bazar municipality, Malda” which was sponsored by Malda municipality under govt. of west Bengal and also co-investigated UGC SAP DRS-I programme on ‘Geo-hazards in Sub-Himalayan West Bengal” from 2009 to 2014. He was a project investigator of North Bengal University assistance project on “An Appraisal of Urban Basic Services and Amenities in Newly Emerged Census Towns: A Case Study of Siliguri Subdivision of Darjiling District, West Bengal” in 2017-2018. Recently he has completed as Principle Investigator of Winter School programme on Geospatial technology that funded and supported by Department of Space and Technology (DST) of Govt. of India. He has jointly edited a book that titled “Application of Geospatial Technology in Geomorphology and Environment”.