ABOUT THE BOOK
Chutki, who lives by the river, leads the author on a quest of discovering the history of a vast mountainous region in the heart of India known as the Central Indian Highlands. Having moved here to ‘escape’ the urban, and ‘educated’ in the urban way of looking at nature, the author is put on a path of unlearning his preconceived notions of how outsiders like himself view nature.
This book spans vast timescales as Chutki walks the author through the history of the ecological transformations and cultural successions in the highlands. Through this journey one aspect becomes clear – the constant in this change remain the tribal communities of the highlands, not merely for being present, but as the living symbols of resilience, of belonging, of oneness, with nature. It explores this aspect by understanding the natural history of the highlands, and how the tribal communities are caught between nature protection and human development in the modern era.
The book borrows its inspiration from the phrase ‘our roots run deep’ – it expands on this axiom to emphasise that just as a culture is rooted to the earth, it is entangled with nature.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Aniruddha Dhamorikar is an ecologist who has worked in central India for a decade. He has a keen interest in understanding human-nature interactions which span cultural, spiritual, economic, and material relationships, whether sympathetic or antagonistic. He writes on a range of subjects related to nature, and maintains a blog called Sahyadrica.
