Book review: Arati Kumar-Rao’s Marginlands is a timely reminder of why we need to listen to our environment

Wetlands are vital fishing grounds for the people living in the Ganga–Brahmaputra basin. (Photo: Arati Kumar-Rao/Marginlands)

In March this year, a report announced the discovery of 77 new glacial lakes in the Kumaon Himalaya. In all likelihood, it’s a piece of news most of us would have missed. Or simply chosen to ignore and move on. The only way it would have hit the limelight and the mainstream was if one of those lakes had caused a flash flood, resulting in loss of life and land lower down. A momentary discussion around climate change and human folly would have ensued. Soon, we would be back to our daily routines.

These blink and miss headlines are reported everyday. Most times, there’s little done in terms of action or reaction, unless it were to directly affect individuals, especially those of a certain privilege. It typically portrays our relative indifference towards a constantly changing world around us and those directly affected by it.

This is a potent cocktail of manmade actions and nature’s response to it. In Marginlands, journalist Arati Kumar-Rao documents firsthand accounts of this apathy toward the environment and how it is affecting lives on the fringes of our country.

Back in the day, most communities lived off the land. To do so, they had to tend to the land and be closely connected with it. It meant developing and adopting their own practices, knowing what suited their environment best. It’s how the desert dwellers of parched western Rajasthan continue to have access to water during the scorching summer months, which allows them to survive independently in a hostile environment as Kumar-Rao finds. But poorly planned government projects disrupted this sustainable ecosystem for a few, making them reliant on alternate sources for their basic needs. And consequently, a handful of these resourceful denizens survive today as the gap between us and our understanding of the surroundings only widens with time.

Over the years, similar narratives have unfolded amid various communities in India, where development has done more harm than good for them. Ill-conceived projects on perennial rivers such as the Ganga and Brahmaputra have swallowed lands and displaced people, besides robbing them of their livelihoods. Each time they moved away to start anew, the water simply crept closer. Today, they have been reduced to living in the constant fear of the river wiping out their existence.

It’s no different for those living at altitude. The relentless plunder of mountains in the name of road construction and hydroelectric projects has resulted in entire slopes disappearing overnight. Joshimath is just one such town that hangs by a thread, even as new cases emerge each day.

Then of course, there is the veritable threat of climate change and rising temperatures. The Arabian Sea has regularly eaten into the shore, toying with the lives of people along the coast. High up in the mountain, glaciers have either completely disappeared or shrunk, the springs down to trickle for the Ladakhis who depend on it. Though these upheavals have been unfolding gradually, the impact has been cataclysmic for those who inhabit these fragile landscapes. Most have had little choice but to put their life on hold and make survival a priority; some have simply moved on with the hope of a better future elsewhere.

Kumar-Rao has spent many days with a few individuals who have faced these challenges and are working towards solutions to combat these changes. More importantly, they’ve been spreading the word on the need for the next generation to go back to age-old wisdom and follow traditional practices, rather than banking on a modern education system that lacks relevance to the land we live in.

When Kumar-Rao quit a promising corporate career, her idea of storytelling was to raise pertinent questions and drive change through her words and visuals. Her intent was to travel slow, sense and observe her surroundings, and interact with the people who have inhabited these lands for generations. She would return to the same spot on multiple occasions and in different seasons to record her observations. It gave her the opportunity to take note of these changes and closely observe how it was affecting the lives of the locals, most of whom are still closely attached to their land.

Over the next decade, development is inevitable. What can be controlled is how it’s done. Kumar-Rao believes that the need of the hour is to work with the land and listen to our environment amid the chaos. And continue building in a way that will stall the degeneration of the environment and safeguard it in the time ahead.

The book is a heartfelt expression of her time spent with marginalised communities and a result of years of enriching travel dedicated to fieldwork and research. By the end of it, there’s a good chance you’ve come across a number of the issues that it addresses. But given our short-term memories and our disregard for the environment, it’s important to keep writing these stories.