Review: Marginlands by Arati Kumar-Rao

Like most tourists, I visited Jaisalmer in the winter. “After the most enchanting descriptions of how the Thar’s residents have coaxed water and agriculture from a seemingly punishing terrain, she reveals how limestone mines, windmills, and a canal — supposedly harbingers of development — have destroyed its water sources, wildlife, agricultural fields, and knowledge nurtured over centuries. The people of the Thar have just 40 cloudy days in a year — and yet they have as many names for clouds!” 264pp, ₹699; Pan Macmillan The essay was a revelation, not just for its insights into the water culture of the Thar desert, but also for how compellingly it described the “rhythm” of the land and its people. In the prologue to her first book, Marginlands: Indian Landscapes on the Brink, she explains how she went about her travels: “I learned a lesson that would set the tone for how I would tell my own stories: to really understand a landscape, you have to invest time, live in it, become one with it.” It was a realisation seeded by her host in the Thar desert, the shepherd-farmer Chhattar Singh, who told her on her first day in his village: “You can’t tell this story if you don’t see for yourself how the desert changes with the seasons and how my people adapt to it.” This sustained engagement comprehensively underlines not just the wonders of a land or the wisdom of its people, but also the detrimental policies and environmental catastrophes they are being subjected to. After the most enchanting descriptions of how the Thar’s residents have coaxed water and agriculture from a seemingly punishing terrain, she reveals how limestone mines, windmills, and a canal — supposedly harbingers of development — have destroyed its water sources, wildlife, agricultural fields, and knowledge nurtured over centuries.