red indian concern for the environment about 1000 words
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With a population of over 1.3 billion, India is soon set to dislodge China as the most populous country of the world. While India has one of the fastest growing populations in the world today, it’s far behind most others when it comes to preserving the environment and the ecology. Today, our country is riddled with a number of environmental concerns which have only aggravated in the last few decades. It is high time we tackled these issues head on as turning a blind eye is no solution. Even as India races ahead to join the league of top economies internationally, it must stick to a growth path that is environmentally sustainable. Neglecting the environment can create havoc and the damage done may become irreparable. So we must wake up and smell the coffee before it’s too late.
Following are some of the major environmental concerns India is grappling with today.
Air Pollution
Air pollution is one of the worst scourges to have affected India. According to a report from the International Energy Agency (IEA), by 2040 there are likely to be about 9 lakh premature deaths in the country due to the drastic rise in air pollution in the country. Average life expectancies are likely to go down by about 15 months because of air pollution. India is also home to 11 out of 20 of the most polluted (in terms of air pollution) cities in the entire world. According to the rankings of the 2016 Environmental Performance Index, India ranks 141 out of 180 countries in terms of air pollution.
Groundwater Depletion
Rapidly depleting levels of groundwater is one of the biggest threat to food security and livelihood in the country. Accessing the groundwater has become increasingly difficult over the decades. According to news reports, excessive exploitation of limited groundwater resources for irrigation of cash crops such as sugarcane has caused a 6 percentage point decline in the availability of water within 10 metres from ground level. Low rainfall and drought are also reasons for groundwater depletion. The north western and southeastern parts of the country are the worst hit. These are also the regions responsible for most of the country’s agricultural production and food crisis is a natural corollary.
Climate Change
In May 2016, Phalodi in Rajasthan recorded a temperature of 51 degrees Celsius – the highest ever in the country. The increasingly tormenting heat waves in the past years are but an indication that global warming and climate change are real challenges that the country is facing now. With the Himalayan glaciers melting at an alarming rate, floods and other such natural disasters are occurring with increasing frequency. The number of forest fires, floods, earthquakes and such other calamities over the past five years has been unprecedented.
Use of Plastics
Unrestrained use of plastics is another major concern for the country. According to data from the Plastindia Foundation, India’s demand for polymers is expected to go up from 11 million tonnes in 2012-13 to about 16.5 million tonnes in 2016-17. India’s per capita plastic consumption went up from about 4 kg in 2006 to some 8 kg in 2010. By 2020, this is likely to shoot up to about 27 kg. To understand the damage that this can cause to the environment, it is important to understand that plastics are one of the least biodegradable materials. An average plastic beverage bottle could take up to 500 years to decompose naturally.
Garbage Disposal and Sanitation
According to a 2014 report by The Economist, about 130 million households (and 600 million population) in the country lack toilets. Over 72 percent of India’s rural population defecate in the open. Ancient practices such as manual scavenging are still in vogue in the country. Lack of safe garbage disposal systems in the country make India one of the most unhygienic countries in the world. The rural regions of the country are worse off than urban tracts in this regard. This is one of the areas where the country’s government and people need to work hard and improve the prevailing conditions.
Loss of Biodiversity
According to the International Union for Conservation of Nature’s Red Data Book, some 47 species of plants and animals in India are listed as critically endangered. Loss of ecology and natural habitats have left many indigenous species, including important ones such as the Siberian crane, Himalayan wolf and Kashmir stag in grave danger of going extinct. Rapid urbanization, poaching and indiscriminate hunting for leather fur etc.
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The environmental wisdom and spirituality of North American Indians is legendary.
Animals were respected as equal in rights to humans. Of course they were hunted, but only for food, and the hunter first asked permission of the animal's spirit. Among the hunter-gatherers the land was owned in common: there was no concept of private property in land, and the idea that it could be bought and sold was repugnant. Many Indians had an appreciation of nature's beauty as intense as any Romantic poet.
Religious beliefs varied between tribes, but there was a widespread belief in a Great Spirit who created the earth, and who pervaded everything. This was a panentheist rather than a pantheist belief. But the pantheistic tone was far stronger than among Christians, and more akin to the pantheism of William Wordsworth. It was linked to an animism which saw kindred spirits in all animals and plants.
The Indians viewed the white man's attitude to nature as the polar opposite of the Indian. The white man seemed hell-bent on destroying not just the Indians, but the whole natural order, felling forests, clearing land, killing animals for sport.
Of course, not everything that every Indian tribe did was wonderfully earth-wise and conservation-minded. The Anasazi of Chaco Canyon probably helped to ruin their environment and destroy their own civilization through deforestation. In the potlatch the Kwakiutl regularly burned heaps of canoes, blankets and other possessions simply to prove their superiority to each other; the potlatch is the archetypal example of wanton overconsumption for status. Even the noble plains Indians often killed far more bisons than they needed, in drives of up to 900 animals.
In other words, the Indians were not an alien race of impossibly wonderful people. They were human just like the rest of us. And in that lies hope.
Wisdom derives from way of life, and is as fragile as nature. Many Indians shared their animism, their respect for nature and their attitude to the land with other hunter-gatherers. But when ways of life change, beliefs change to support them. The advent of agriculture and then industry brought massive shifts in attitudes to nature (see How we fell from unity.)
Beliefs can also change ways of life. Our present way of life is laying waste to the environment that supports us. New beliefs can help us to change that way of life, and in arriving at those beliefs, we can learn immensely from the beliefs of the North American Indians.
Perhaps the most famous of all Indian speeches about the environment is the beautiful speech of Chief Seattle of the Squamish tribe of the Pacific Northwest USA. But alas, Seattle's "environmental" speech was written by scriptwriter Ted Perry, in the winter of 1971/72, for a Canadian film on ecology, and attributed to Seattle for aesthetic effect. It is still a brilliant piece of work which distills the essence of many scattered Indian speeches. Those who wish to read Perry's piece can follow the above link. Also read in full Seattle's original speech, a moving lament on the passing of the Indian, but with only a fraction of the ecological awareness.
In a sense it's a pity that the story came out - it undermined a very fruitful myth. But by assembling the wisdom from many different Indian speakers and writers, as I have tried to do below, it is possible to glimpse that same embracing pantheistic attitude to the earth.