By Dinesh C Sharma
Urban flooding. Human-animal conflict. Deforestation. Air pollution. Vanishing species. Erosion of coastline. These are some of the environmental and conservation challenges India is facing currently. They affect communities and livelihoods, habitats of wild animals on land and the sea, water bodies and the quality of air. At the same time, they are intertwined with the challenges of development, economic growth, food security and population growth. They are complex, location-specific and have a long history. Yet, the public discourse on nature and environment is often restricted to policies, development projects and occasional judicial pronouncements.
Nature Contested: Ecology, Society, and Environment in Contemporary India is an attempt to cut through this maze and present specific case studies, the situation on the ground, lived experience and a deep history of the problem. The highly focused case studies contained in the book illustrate how the environment serves as an ongoing site of social struggle. Written by environmental researchers, conservation experts and practitioners, the volume has been edited by three eminent scholars. Mahesh Rangarajan is a leading environmental historian and professor at Ashoka University. Ravi Agarwal is an environmentalist, writer, and artist who founded the advocacy group Toxics Link. Rinki Sarkar, an independent researcher and economist, specialises in ecological economics and sustainable livelihoods.
Dealing with the long history of environmental challenges and activism in India, particularly since the 1980s when the process of liberalisation was set in motion slowly, the editors say that they do not see ‘any way of rolling back the twin processes of globalisation and liberalisation’ but feel that there was ‘a case to renegotiate some of their key features.’ They contend that there is a need for forging new kinds of alliances because the issues are both deeply socio-cultural and ecological. The volume, therefore, includes case studies that unpack specific challenges through history, current challenges and innovative ways to move forward. The editors note that ‘the ongoing century is the time to draw on history for insight, on crisis for our sense of momentum and on creative impulses to expand the spaces for collective and individual action.’
The book covers a range of eco-systems – marine, river, forests and urban areas. It includes two essays on India’s rapidly growing cities – Hita Unnikrishnan, Harini Nagendra, and Manjunatha B look closely at Bengaluru, while Nityanand Jayaraman focuses on Chennai’s growth dilemmas. Both the case studies track the historic decline and shrinking of urban lakes, grazing pastures, and wetlands. They show that what real estate developers view as vacant land or wasteland is actually an important ecological buffer and resource for the urban poor. Jayaraman argues that building over Chennai’s wetlands not only displaces marginalised communities but also directly sets the city up for recurring, severe environmental disasters, as seen in recent years. In the case of Bengaluru, which has no perennial river and is landlocked, its water bodies were critical in making and keeping the land habitable for 500 years. Another IT hub, Hyderabad, can draw lessons here.
Two essays – Aarthi Sridhar (Marine (In)Justice: A Long View of Nature) and Divya Karnad (Fluid Boundaries: Fisheries and Migration on India’s Coasts) shift the traditional environmental focus from land to the ocean. They show that India’s vast coastline is not just a geographical border but a shifting home for traditional fishing communities. Their essays detail how state-led commercialisation, aggressive industrial port expansion, and shifting migration patterns push local fishermen out of their ancestral waters. This demonstrates how modern maritime policies regularly value corporate profits over traditional livelihoods.
Divya Karnad’s research on Srikakulam (the least developed coastal district of Andhra Pradesh) fisheries highlights the complex socio-economic realities of inter-state fisherfolk migration along the Indian coastline. A significant portion of its fishing community regularly migrates to the West Coast, mainly to Ratnagiri and Sindhudurgto operate and trawl vessels. She argues that because these migrants are stripped of decision-making and detached from the local ecosystem, their only goal is to maximise catch volume for the vessel owner.
Arupjyoti Saikia from IIT Guwahati provides a perspective on Assam and its highly volatile, river-dominated landscapes. He tracks how both colonial and post-colonial governments have consistently misunderstood the Brahmaputra River. Rather than accepting seasonal floods as a natural, life-giving cycle for local agriculture, modern engineering has attempted to chain the river using embankments. This approach backfires, making local communities more vulnerable and turning manageable natural cycles into destructive regular disasters. ‘ The Brahmaputra and its floodplains are among the finest examples of our fraught relationship with nature, offering a unique window to the world of contemporary environment,’ says Saikia. Far more than any other region in India, nature’s present is not only contested in Assam but is the most acute where the realms intersect – land and water, cultivation and wet savannah, river and land, hill and plain.
In his essay, Anand Vaidya examines land and forest rights movements, and explores how Dalit and marginalised communities in states like Uttar Pradesh use the legal system to claim their ancestral lands. He highlights a vital point often ignored by mainstream environmentalists – conservation laws are frequently used by upper-caste elites and state authorities to harass and evict vulnerable groups. For these communities, securing a forest right is not just about environmental protection. It is a fundamental struggle for human dignity and survival against deeply rooted caste hierarchies.
Through specific and diverse case studies, the book shows that the environment in contemporary India remains a deeply contested space – be it endangered wetlands in Chennai, Brahmaputra floodplains in Assam, vanishing lakes in Bengaluru or a forest clearing in Uttar Pradesh. Everywhere there is the complex intersection of environmental degradation, state policy, and social inequality. Rather than treating nature as a pristine wilderness to be fenced off, the book frames the environment as a deeply contested political arena. All the essays are deeply researched, scholarly and present a deep historical perspective of contemporary challenges. It is a must-read for anyone interested in understanding the environment beyond sensational headlines about natural disasters and animal-human conflicts.
Nature Contested: Ecology, Society, and Environment in Contemporary India
Mahesh Rangarajan, Ravi Agarwal, Rinki Sarkar (Editors)
Orient BlackSwan
225 pages
Rs 955
[The reviewer, Dr Dinesh C Sharma, is a columnist and author based in New Delhi]
