Promode Kant IFS
Director, IGWES

Promode Kant is an Additional Principal Chief Conservator in the Indian Forest Service and is under deputation from the Government of India to set up this institute of advanced learning in the field of global warming. He specializes in the role of Land Use, Land-use Change and Forestry (LULUCF) in climate change mitigation, particularly in carbon sequestration and storage in vegetation and mitigation through replacement of fossil fuels by biofuels and has a number of publications to his credit. His other fields of specialization are sustainable management of forests and equity issues in tribal owned forests, economic assessment of ecological and environmental consequences of major developmental works and wildlife management. He has taught in the Indira Gandhi National Forest Academy as a visiting Professor and is presently a Visiting Professor in the Department of Forestry in the University of Joensuu in Finland where he teaches climate change related issues in forestry and the international conservation laws. He was designated UNFCCC expert on afforestation/reforestation during 2004-2005. He has held top management positions in government having been head of the Afforestation wing of the Tamilnadu Forest Department; Managing Director of the Tamilnadu Tea Plantation Corporation, Coonoor; Regional Forestry Chief for the northeastern India and Director of Project Tiger in Tamilnadu. He is a reviewer of many national and international journals.
Email:pramode.kant@gmail.com

Dr. M. A. Khalid
Deputy Director & Associate Professor

Dr. Khalid, a doctorate in Zoology (AMU, Aligarh) and PG Diploma in Remote Sensing (IIRS, Dehradun), is a trained ecologist with more than 16 years of professional/academic experience as wildlife biologist (WII, Dehradun), Protected Area Ecologist (World Bank’s IEDP-GEF Project in West Bengal). His areas of interest are Climate Change, wildlife/wetland biodiversity, coastal zone/freshwater fisheries, Remote Sensing/GIS. He has contributed in India’s Natcom project for field studies in Uttarkashi area. He has delivered lectures on Climate Change, Kyoto Protocol, CDM etc, in IAS/IFS officers training programme. He is a guest Professor for various Universities in India. He has conducted ecological studies in Nepal and Bhutan and coordinated a number of International/National training programmes on Biodiversity/Wildlife/Climate Change for Forest Officers. He has coordinated many World Bank projects as Biodiversity Expert in The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI) and as Training development expert for a Japan Bank of Industrial Cooperation (JBIC) project. His other assignments include member of Gangetic Plain Eco-working Group for National Biodiversity Strategy and Action Plan (NBSAP) for MoEF, Govt. of India, Member of the State Level Steering Committee for NBSAP-Uttaranchal, and member Board of Studies & Academic Council of TERI-SAS. He has published a number of papers / articles in International Journals / Magazines like IUCN Earthwatch (Sterling), Appropriate Technology (London) etc. and is life member/Reviewer of International bodies/Journals like Asian Fisheries Society (Phillipines), International Journal of Geoinformatics (Bangkok) and National Societies like National Remote Sensing Society (Dehradun), National Environmental Science Academy (Delhi) etc.
Email:makhalid@amity.edu

Dr Binod Kumar Das
Assistant Professor

Dr Binod Kumar Das (b.1969) is a Social Scientist (Ph.D, JNU, New Delhi). He has twelve years of experience working with UN organizations and national level NGOs. He worked with Centre for Media Studies, New Delhi as Project Director from 1994-1999. During CMS tenure, he evaluated many programmes of Government of India. Dr Das worked with UNICEF Bihar as Social Mobilisation Consultant for two years. Mobilisation of all the stakeholders towards polio eradication initiatives was his main task. Afterwards, he joined Kolkata UNICEF and worked as Child Health Consultant. He also supported Agragamee (a national level NGO) as a Socio-Economic Analyst of Watershed Programme supported by German Agro Action. He has documented the CARE’s interventions after super cyclone (1999) in Orissa. He has contributed papers in an International Symposium on Participatory Plant Breeding and Knowledge Management for Strengthening Rural Livelihoods organized by MS Swaminathan Research Foundation, Chennai. Currently, he is a faculty of Institute of Global Warming and Ecological Studies (IGWES). The socio economic impacts of climate change, climate change induced migration and human adaptation to climate change in South Asia will be his area of work in IGWES.
Email:bkumar1@amity.edu

Keshav C. Das
Assistant Professor

Keshav C. Das is a Master in Rural Management, from North Eastern Hill University, Shillong and is presently, pursuing Ph. D on Strategic Management and Policy Formulation for infrastructure development in Assam under Gauhati University. He was also a Faculty in Assam Institute of Management (AIM) and taught on Natural Resource Management, Agriculture Marketing, Agriculture Service Management, International Business in Agriculture, Non-Corporate Management and Entrepreneurship. Mr Das has several publications in National Institute of Rural Development (NIRD), Journals.

He was associated with several research projects such as Rural Infrastructure Development Project (World Bank supported), Scientific Preparation of Master Plan for Bodoland Territorial Council Area (Sponsored by Ministry of DONER, Govt. of India), Market Study of Milk Consumption in Assam, International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) and Assam Competitiveness Agricultural Project, Govt. of India. His present research interests are socio-economic aspects of climate change, climate change induced migration in South East Asia and application of Swarm Intelligence.
Email:kcdas@amity.edu

Debojyoti Chakraborty
Lecturer

He has done his masters in Environment Management from Forest Research Institute University, Dehradun, India. He has been associated with many prestigious research projects like “Beyond Kyoto: EU- India CDM Partnership: Promoting Stake holder’s Dialogue and Analysis of Barriers in Forestry Mitigation Project”, ICFRE, Dehradun, India and has worked as Research Fellow in Forest Research Institute and as  Project Coordinator with Society for Conservation of Flora and Fauna, (S.C.F.F), India before joining IGWES.

His master’s thesis was on Impacts of Habitat Fragmentation on Hoolock gibbon, an endangered primate species of Northeast India under US Fish and Wildlife Services Project, from Wildlife Institute of India.  He is the member of IUCN, Primate Specialist group, South Asia and twice been the recipient of Guru Dronacharya Sanman   for exemplary contribution in the field of development of arts, culture and environment.

He has, to his credit several publications in reputed journals and magazines. His interests include Global Climate Change, Biodiversity and Wildlife Conservation and Wildlife Photography.

Adjunct Faculty:

Prof. (Dr) B. K Goswami
Director, Amity Centre for Biocontrol & Plant Disease Management

Dr Goswami is a Botanist with specialization in Plant Pathology and Nematology. He has three decades of research experience with excellent contribution on disease complexes caused by root-knot nematodes and several major fungal and viral diseases on crops. He is a pioneer of nematode-virus interaction. His classical work on eco friendly management by botanical antagonist, oil seed cake and fungal bio-agent/ VA mycorrhiza as evidenced by above 120 publications in both National and International journal of repute.

He has guided more than a dozen Ph. D. students of the Post-Graduate School at Indian Agricultural Research Institute (IARI), New Delhi on above aspects of plant diseases caused by fungi and nematodes.

He has developed non-chemical management packages against soil borne diseases which increased the yield of farmers. Several times, he has visited Germany, UK, France and Holland as a Visiting Scientist. He was also a Post Doctoral Fellow of AV Humboldt Foundation of West Germany. Presently, he is the Director of Amity Center for Bio Control and Plant Disease Management at Amity University, UP. Vulnerability of food crops owing to climate change and control of pest, diseases and nematodes will be his area of work in Institute of Global Warming and Ecological Studies (IGWES).

Gulshan Bhardwaj
Secretary to Director

Mr. Gulshan has worked with Human Rights Law Network New Delhi, an NGO working in the field of Human Rights and for the development of the underprivileged people. He has coordinated a number of training programmes for corporate and non-corporate houses on various issues on human rights. He has also worked with India Law Services, New Delhi, as a Personal Assistant to the Senior Director. He coordinates all teaching, training, consultancies in IGWES and is also working on socio-economic impact on climate change on urban settlements. Further, he is also partly responsible for the maintenance of the IGWES’s website.
Email:gbhardwaj@amity.edu

Swati Singh
Research Associate

Swati Singh is a post graduate in Natural Resources Management from TERI University, New Delhi. Her area of interest includes climate change, biofuels, ecology and biodiversity. She was associated with Energy and Policy Division, TERI as intern and during that tenure she conducted socio-economic study in Kaladera village, in Rajasthan for Coca Cola, India. She was also associated with Biomass Energy Technology Application (BETA) group of TERI, during this tenure she prepared biodiesel from Mahua oil and subsequently optimized the process.