SAHELI MITRA'S ARTICLE : BRING IN NATURE: SHOWER WITH LOVE

We often say, ‘Look Within.’ I say ‘Bring Nature Within.’ You do not then need to look out, travel, lead marches against felling of trees by authorities or others or even hold Nature Conservation Day once a year. Because if each of us can create an urban jungle in whatever little space we live in, we actually create acres of plant life within our living space. That is probably the only way we can conserve nature in the long run. 

Else, no amount of activism will prompt Nature Conservation with the Amazon rainforests being burnt, with bushfires in Australia, with acres of jungles cleared in countries like India for development of roads etc. As technology marches on, as civilisations grow, nature will bear the brunt and only individual approach to loving and caring for a seed sprouting into a seedling will help us turn our ‘home’ into a green space and save on energy, electricity, food and lots more.

I will tell you how. Two memories still play around that turned me a die-hard (some call me mad) nature lover, spending thousands after buying plants, manure, tending them and their upkeep at the cost of health, money, time etc. But I need to do that, I badly need those fluttering green leaves staring at me every morning as I open my eyes, my yellow Alamonda plant with its sun-kissed or rain-drenched flowers peeping at me through the windows. I need that squirrel hopping on our Plumeria and Balsam every day searching for food, as I sit with my laptop in my green urban space, my green work-station. I need the bees and butterflies popping in and out, with some even invading indoors with my son running around in fear of being stung! Yet, I need them for they tell me ‘life goes on.’ The eternal life-cycle moves beyond clouds, stars, trees, creatures and Me. The excitement they create around is unfathomable.

And what were those memories? The day my mom who herself is a big-time gardener recited the poem of Rabindranath Tagore where he says after travelling thousands of miles, he returns to his own land where he missed a dewdrop on a leaf blade. Imagine, if you do not have leaves around, how on an autumn morning you will see dewdrops? If you did not have flowers blooming in your garden, how would you know what are the colours of a rainbow? And if birds do not visit you, twittering on the branches, how will you know what music is all about?

I am happy to see even my friends staying in urban flats with small balconies (unlike my own house that has two big terraces) are also into small-space gardening. That’s an art that many often share on my Tree Group, where in the same container you can grow several vegetables together. Well, veggies are the in-thing today. To beat deadly diseases like cancer, the doctors advise you to grow your own vegetables. And trust me some veggies grow very easily. Chillies, tomatoes, brinjals, bhindi, dhania, lettuce, bitter gourds and gourds. Just keep their seeds and throw them on big drums or plastic containers that you would otherwise throw away. Why increase the plastic load? Instead recycle them as veggie pots. Trust me growing your own vegetables comes with its perks, you enjoy pesticide free fresh sprouts and the happiness it gives to see the veggie growing can never be bought with any sum of money.

The other memory that had turned me into an ardent gardener was the sprouting of a pumpkin seed I had sown in my childhood just for fun. The germination, the sprout, then the climber, the tendrils looking for support and finally the fruiting… they all taught me life’s incredible lessons… look for opportunities, never give up, even when no one cares for you, life springs from nowhere, reproduces, produces, gives you back. Yes, that’s what nature is all about. It truly Gives You Back. You cut on your food buy from the markets, you make your home cooler, you need to use less air conditioning, thus you also contribute to decreasing green-house gases and protecting environment. Even if you do not have much space outside, you can always bring plants indoors.

Indoor plants purifying the urban polluted air is a big healing tool these days. Be it the Peace Lily or the Anthurium or even succulents and cacti, they will take care of the air you breathe in. Create that microcosm within your space, how very tiny it is. One day while driving down a highway in Bengal, I had stopped at a ramshackle tea-stall where the owner and his family lived and served tea and biscuits to travellers like me. As I was waiting there sipping tea, I suddenly observed in that small space, they had made a macha on their roof and quite a number of bottle gourds were growing in splendour, while some chilli plants around were bearing red chillies already. So, where there is a will there is a way. 

And trust me Nature is the most resilient winner, humans have ever come across. It will continue to overwhelm us, so best is to embrace it like I did all my life. And you will be rewarded. Today, on World Nature Conservation Day, an abundance of smiling Rain Lillies bloom in my garden, even during these times of a cruel pandemic wreaking havoc around. I thus keep smiling as a baby Hill Mynah (popularly called Shalik) born in our garden, learns to fly with its doting parents teaching it nature’s ways. And every time it sees me with my camera on, she flips and runs away for cover. I do not chase her, for I know she will come to me on her own. Nature will come within, give it a way to and it will heal all of us in our own small space.

No other metropolitan city in India can claim of having a biodiversity register. But our very own  Kolkata this year turned the first major metropolitan city of India to have prepared a detailed register of biodiversity. It was unveiled recently by the city mayor Firhad Hakim. The 520-page document has names of 399 plant species along with 283 animal species. The document was presented to the people of Kolkata at the Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) headquarters.

The People’s Biodiversity Register (PBR) usually details flora and fauna within the limits of any city as well as its land uses and human activities. KMC already had a Biodiversity Management Committee (BMC), supervised by West Bengal’s Biodiversity Board with the help of non-profit organisations. Biodiversity registers assist local communities and their activities to a large extent and hence unveiling of such a register has become so important. The document will help in fighting climate change in Eastern India’s largest city, which has increasingly faced the brunt of inclement weather from cyclones, to sudden squalls uprooting trees to constant depletion of ground water, floods and even scorching heat with temperatures soaring beyond the 40 degree mark, something that has never happened in Kolkata before. As environmentalist Kaustav Jana mentions: “Such registers help in understanding how one can mitigate future ill effects of such climate change that will increasingly create a pressure on the biodiversity of the city and even many species can go extinct in the process. The faster we address this issue, we can save this city, particularly because it is situated on the banks with the sea not far away. We all know that sea levels are rising and a time might come when Kolkata will be under water. Now is the time to take action because the Forest Survey of India’s recent report mentions that Kolkata has the least greenery among all metro cities.”

KMC has already been considering setting up urban forestry zones to improve Kolkata’s greenery quotient. Stringent orders have been passed to both the police and the civic body to protect water bodies and their biodiversity too. Revathi Sharma who has been working on East Calcutta Wetlands, that is a Ramsar site, says: “Kolkata since ages have been a city where rampantly water bodies had been filled up and constructions made. Even East Calcutta Wetlands was targeted by land sharks. Hence protecting such water bodies along with pond biodiversity is an absolute necessity of the hour.” 

As per the list Kolkata still has a healthy biodiversity. The species include:

• 138 trees
• 126 Chinese vegetables
• 33 medicinal plants
• Nearly 100 other plants
• Nearly 70 butterflies
• 47 fish
• 84 birds
• 22 mammals

A coordination process among 10 state departments has been put in place to conserve and promote biodiversity. Even biodiversity parks will come up soon. The Biodiversity Board is working in tandem with Calcutta University’s Botany department to promote microbial fertilisers and pesticides in West Bengal that cost much less than existing chemical fertilisers which are being used rampantly in crop fields further leading to depletion of soil and biodiversity of the area. Such bio fertilisers are now being used in districts like South 24 Parganas, North 24 Parganas, Paschim Midnapur, Birbhum and Bankura.

The cost of paddy cultivation with such fertilisers have also proved to be economical and the productivity remained unchanged, rather increased in some areas. Along with this activity, West Bengal Biodiversity board has also done lots for conserving bio-diversity of the entire state.

Their activities include:

• Constitution of Biodiversity Management Committees (BMCs) in all the local bodies of West Bengal (except three Gram Panchayats).

• Provided expertise support in preparation of People’s Biodiversity Register of all the BMCs of the state. Till date documentation of 90% of the PBRs of the state is complete.

• Baneswar Shiva Dighi, Cooch Behar District which is a habitat of Black Softshell Turtle (Nilssonia nigricans Anderson, 1875, locally revered as ‘Mohan’) is being declared as a Biodiversity Heritage Site as per section 37(1) of the Biological Diversity Act, 2002.

• Board facilitated registration of fourteen Traditional Rice Varieties from West Bengal under Protection of Plant Varieties & Farmers' Rights Authority.

• Conservation initiatives for Traditional Rice Diversity and Locally threatened plants.

• In compliance to the provisions of Section 7 of the Biological Diversity Act, 2002, applicants intending to access biological resources from West Bengal for commercial utilization has to apply in Form-I and Form-A, and if applicable, has to comply to the Act’s Access and Benefit Sharing provisions. Till date Rs. 29.88 Lac received as Access and Benefit Sharing amount from bioresources based commercial entities.

 • For last two years the Board has been conducting the assessment of Migratory water birds and their habitats with the help of external experts.

• District-wise documentation of Fish faunal diversity has been going on with the help of external experts. Completed in eight districts.

• Documentation of Mango diversity of Malda and Murshidabad districts has been completed with the help of external experts.

• District-wise documentation of Sacred Groves has been completed with the help of external experts.

Saheli Mitra is a celebrated author, poet and journalist who runs her own Content and Creative Company Tales Talks Walks and is Co-Founder of Roots & Shoots (Home of Alpona Gift Items). She is also an Mphil in Environmental Biology and runs her own Tree Group called To Trees With Love. On free days Saheli calls herself a Home Gardener and grows everything from flowers to vegetables on her roof top gardens.