A Post-Course Update from the fourth month of the Pagdandi Fellowship 2025-26 As the last of this year’s monsoon rains finally came to a halt and with the cold beginning to set in, we headed for the Narmada Valley, the final location of the Pagdandi Fellowship. We reached Jeevika Ashram in Indrana, a village on… Read More Nature, Culture & Economy in the Narmada Valley
The Mohana of Pakistan’s Sindh province once thrived on the lake but pollution and drought have caused the fragile ecosystem to collapse, along with their way of life A Mohana hunter holds a thin branch with a living bird tethered to the end, which he uses as a decoy to trap wild birds By Guillaume Petermann… Read More The bird people of Lake Manchar: surviving in a vanishing oasis
The fundamental problem is this: that most of the means of communication are owned or influenced by the very rich George Monbiot If this were just a climate crisis, we would fix it. The technology, money and strategies have all been at hand for years. What stifles effective action is a deadly conjunction: the climate… Read More Dark forces are preventing us fighting the climate crisis – by taking knowledge hostage
The Atacama desert in Chile sits long and lean, sandwiched between the Andes Mountains and the Pacific Ocean. The desert’s extreme aridity makes it one of the clearest places on Earth to view the night sky and is famous for being home to the largest radio telescope in the world. Anadolu via Getty Images/Lucas Aguayo… Read More Rare wildflowers blanket Atacama desert
Since 2014, this has been the RSS–BJP’s consistent strategy: criminalize dissent, discredit activists, and rewrite constitutional morality. They know that a large-scale civil war is impossible in a subcontinent as vast and diverse as India. What they fear are small, localized movements, like Ladakh’s, that cannot be militarily conquered, but only silenced with force. The assault… Read More The Unmaking of Ladakh: RSS, Corporate Power, and the War on India’s Plural Soul
After about 8,300 nautical miles Jess Rowe and Miriam Payne can’t wait to share their ‘tales of the high seas’ when they land in Cairns, Queensland Rowe (L) and Payne approach the Great Barrier Reef in the Coral Sea on 17 October, 2025. Photograph: Brian Cassey/AFP/Getty Images Six months in a rowboat in the South… Read More Finish line in sight for British duo rowing nonstop from Peru to Australia
An Indonesian songbird once nearly extinct in the wild, the Bali starling, is making a comeback through community-led conservation on Nusa Penida and beyond. Heather Physioc NUSA PENIDA, Indonesia — Two young conservation workers rattle up on a motorbike and dismount at the edge of a coconut grove. Picking through husks, fallen fronds and stray… Read More Indigenous-led protections spark Bali starling’s recovery in the wild
In a new study, scientists reconstructed streamflow records going back 1,300 years to show that the basin has faced its worst droughts over the period in just the last few decades. And those droughts are well outside the range of natural climate variability. Mehebub Sahana The Ganges, a lifeline for hundreds of millions across South Asia,… Read More The Ganga is drying faster than ever – here’s what it means for the region and the world
NB: My old schoolmates from the Sainik School Kunjpura will recall that the village of Kunjpura is named after the Demoiselle Crane, which is a sub-species of the Siberian crane. The name koonj is derived from the Sanskrit word kraunch, which is a cognate Indo-European term for crane itself. Our School magazine was named The Grey Kunj. In the winter the lake besides the school… Read More Siberian crane: Back from the brink
Teeming with wildlife under lush canopies, this area in Australia’s island state is one of the world’s most remarkable – and one most in need of protection Elfy Scott Witnessing Takayna/Tarkine is a rare privilege. After I press through metres of the dense, dry shrubs that skirt the forest floor, the rainforest quickly opens into… Read More Masked owls, wild devils & giant crayfish: inside the ancient forests of Tasmania’s Takayna
After the truth-shower 