As Hindus, our attitude towards nature is today predominantly anthropocentric. Man-Nature separation which was quite alien to us culturally has now been ingrained into our development model and choices.

In this talk the focus is on how the notion of sacred nature is integral to the Hindu consciousness. In particular the focus is on how Hindu tradition deified the River Ganga.

This perspective is particularly important in light of contemporary knowledge politics where nature worship is seen as an exclusive privy of forest peoples, tribals etc. Attempts to anchor the discourse on such topics of ecological importance with a Hindu traditional lens is also treated suspiciously and gets bracketed under various names like Hindutva-Lite.

The emphasis here is on the fact that ecological consciousness is central and integral to Hindu tradition and it is not a side show.

Click here to watch - Balancing Competing Interests for Sustaining Riverine Ecology by Halley Kalyan 42 minutes

Also watch: Vikas Vimarsa - Critiquing Development From a Dharmic Standpoint 

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