covid is good for nature

  ENVIRONMENT Is nature ‘reclaiming’ the earth in this time of COVID-19?   A peacock perches on a rock amidst an urban jungle in Hyderabad. Sifting truth from fake news depends on what you are looking at, the angle you are looking at it from, and how long a look you are prepared to take It is after sunset, and I can hear sounds I haven’t heard in years: the chorus of chirping crickets, serenading frogs and screeching owls. By day, the squabbling squirrels that hang out on the Bauhinea trees that line the footpath, and the brahminy kite perched on the electric wire, let me come up closer than they used to before. My backyard, frequented by a couple of red-vented bulbuls and a coucal, now has new visitors — sunbirds flitting from corner to corner, hovering around the pomegranate flowers, checking out the dried leaves. And the green bee-eaters I hadn’t seen in years are back! Some 15 years ago, when we first moved into this neck of the woods in Bengaluru, ...

covid 19 nature healing We have been living in a bubble, a bubble of false comfort and denial. In the rich nations, we have begun to believe we have transcended the material world. The wealth we’ve accumulated – often at the expense of others – has shielded us from reality. Living behind screens, passing between capsules – our houses, cars, offices and shopping malls – we persuaded ourselves that contingency had retreated, that we had reached the point all civilisations seek: insulation from natural hazards. Now the membrane has ruptured, and we find ourselves naked and outraged, as the biology we appeared to have banished  storms through our lives . The temptation, when this pandemic has passed, will be to find another bubble. We cannot afford to succumb to it. From now on, we should expose our minds to the painful realities we have denied for too long. Many countries will not be able to keep up with the Paris agreement pledges to reduce carbon emissions. Even then, for now t...