El Niños have typically meant turbulence in India - a country where much of the working population depends on rainfed fields for their livelihood. That's because an El Nino make those life giving rains far more capricious. The really monster El Niños have changed India forever. For this piece I have focussed on the El …
Continue reading El Nino coming? Why the ‘little boy’ spells big trouble for India.
Snowfall in Joshimath, Image from Wikimedia Commons/Vaibhav78545 There are places where angels fear to tread - such a place is the Himalayas, which rose as the Indian plate banged into the Eurasian place about 50 million years ago. The Indian plate continues to push and the Himalayas still rise, making the Himalayan zone one of …
Continue reading Joshimath. Why is it sinking? Why we acted the way it did? How can move forward?
This was originally published in http://www.moneycontrol.com on 1st January 2023 Art by Manian for Kalki Krishnamurthi's Ponniyin Selvan Have you seen Ponniyin Selvan Part-I? If a picture is worth a thousand words, then a film is worth at least a million. No words could convey how wealthy and mighty the Cholas were as well as …
Continue reading The Wealth Behind Ponniyin Selvan: The Kaveri and the Kallanai
What does our fight against pollution (as indeed climate change) tell us about ourselves?
What made water engineering so effective in ancient India - the time of Ponniyin Selvan?
It's been about two weeks since million-dollar homes were flooded in Bengaluru. There has been reams of press on why it happened and what can it be done about it. Sadly, much of the analysis misses the deeper questions. If the answers were only "encroachments on storm drains, must clear" - "lets Noida-tower the apartment …
Continue reading A fortnight after the Bengaluru Floods. Will it happen again? Yes, most likely.
Climate speaks through water. As our climate changes, rising global temperatures are causing more intense storms; untimely and intense rainfall is leading to frequent floods and droughts, causing sea levels to rise and glaciers to melt. We face not only a rapidly careening climate crisis but also a brutal change in our water reality. We HAVE to adapt for the future NOW.
Where has it flooded 2. Why has it flooded? Why here? Why now? a. Elevation The low-lying areas (green & blue) have flooded first. Source: https://en-gb.topographic-map.com/maps/lpj1/Bengaluru/; Flooded areas marked out in blue. Moreover, areas subject to the highest flooding were often the lowest lying within a vicinity. Naturally, water flowed into them. b. Land-use change …
Photo by Ray Bilcliff on Pexels.com Many of the seeds of the our tangled thicket of a water crisis originate in colonial times - a penchant for growing crops unsuited to local climes, a centralized control-and-command approach to irrigation and water supply, and a certain disdain for traditional water technologies that 'get' India's water. We've …
Continue reading India@75: Tracing the colonial hand in evolving water tapestry
Aadi Perukku - respecting water.
Climaction 