Page 18 - Seniorstoday March 2023
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nature? When Bangalore shattered its local
loop of dependence by importing water
from outside, people forgot the importance
of their local sources of water.
Yet, as our research has shown, for its
resilience. The city has grown so large that
piped water from distant rivers can no
longer supply all its needs.
a sports stadium by the 20th century, Thus resurgent citizen movements
leaving behind only a tiny pond for across Bangalore have begun to focus
ceremonial religious purposes. As long as on protecting and restoring in their
lakes and wells supplied water, essential neighbourhoods, which will also recharge
for the activities of daily life, they were the water below ground. In some low
worshipped as sacred and protected as life- income settlements, where adequate water
giving. supply is a constant challenge, community
wells, once ignored, are now being
assiduously protected and maintained as
well.
The same pattern – of an early, close
relationship with nature, followed by a
break, and later a resurgent interest in
the connection – is also playing out when
it comes to trees. Early residents did not
only focus on water, but also “greened”
CANTONMENTS BANGALORE this dusty, hot landscape of the dry Deccan
Furneaux, JH (1895) Glimpses of India. A grand photo-
graphic history of the Land of Antiquity, the vast Empire plateau. Successive rulers from the 16th
of the East. Historical Publishing Company. Philadelphia. century onwards, and common citizens
Furneaux, Wikmedia
planted millions of trees over centuries.
Rituals celebrating the overflowing of lakes
during the monsoon by paying homage
to the lake goddess kept the importance
of lakes in the forefront of people’s
imaginations. But once piped water began
to be provided in the 1890s, these water The number of lakes in Bangalore increased between
bodies began to decay. By the end of the 1791 and 1888 then rapidly decreased after piped water
19th century, wells and lakes began to be was brought in. Sreerupa Sen, CC BY-NC-ND
polluted with garbage, sewage, and even Each settlement was greened with a
corpses during times of epidemics and gundathope – a woodlot commonly planted
disease. with fruiting trees, jackfruit, mango and
tamarind – which provided shade, fruits,
Citizens nurturing nature firewood for cooking, grazing material for
What transformed this centuries-long, cattle, and occasionally timber as well.
strong relationship between people and When one tree was chopped down, another
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