Environment

KEY POINTS

·         The recent report that ranks India 177 out of 180 countries in the Environmental Performance Index is not just an indicator of pollution but is as much an indicator of our indifference.

·         It is not just about pollution of nature but also of our society.

·         It is the prior pollution of the social world that creates natural pollution.

·         This argument should not be too surprising because, it has been claimed that the nature is already social.

·         If garbage is a worry, it is as much our social practices that make it an environmental problem.

·         If our air is so badly polluted, it is as much due to the indifference of governance as the exhaust caused by thousands of vehicles.

·         It is the social pollution related to certain caste practices that influences environmental disasters ranging from toilet use to dealing with dirt and pollution in general.

·         There is no pure nature that is available to us, and our ideas of nature are most often socially constructed.

·         Thus, pollution of nature is as much the pollution of the social and vice versa.

·         In a society where it is so difficult to change certain social habits, the development it has seen so far would affect every town and city in ways that have been detrimental to the people living there.

Way Ahead

·         The point is that an effective way to tackle the pollution of the natural world is to recognise that this pollution is symptomatic of social problems also.

·         Our air or water quality index will improve when we attack social pollution in conjunction with natural pollution.

·         Being indifferent to the unequal access to wealth, education and health of millions of citizens is as bad as dumping toxic wastes into our drinking water.

·         Unless we deal with social pollution as stringently as environmental pollution, it will be a sorry world that we leave behind for our children.