By Parag Ranjan Dutta
A very bright morning in the year 3020 — the temperature of the earth has decreased by few degrees and the last human being had disappeared about hundred years ago. When the Time Machine captained by HG Wells with last few members of the human race, which included a jungle boy, landed in what was once known as Times Square, New York, was surprised to see a herd of caribou grazing on the green pastures. Tundra region had extended to once known Russia and around the same time a group of penguins have come for winter breeding ground near Grand Kremlin Palace of Moscow and Olive Ridley turtles were laying their eggs in the Marine Drive area of Mumbai.
Yes it is a fantasy world scenario that we cannot visualise in the wildest of imaginations but can happen to mankind if we don’t act and change ourselves now.
It took millions of years for the first form of life to evolve in water. Our earliest ancestor Australopithecus believed to have appeared in Africa around four and a half million years ago. The best creation of nature, the modern humans or Homo sapiens (from Latin for ‘wise man’) came much later.
Today the entire world is bewildered as the pandemic corona virus posed a serious threat to mankind. A question may be raised why it did not spread to Beijing and Shanghai, the two largest cities of China but was transmitted to far off countries like Britain, Spain, France, Italy, Spain and the US.
The present crisis may well be attributed to a number of reasons like exponential growth of human population, excessive abuse of nature and tremendous expenditure on military budgets and proliferation without caring for laboratory research work to control any eventuality, like the present one. China’s omnivorous food habits and their sinister design to prepare a biological warhead cannot be ruled out either. No one really knows what is happening within an iron curtain inside China today.
In 1798, Thomas Robert Malthus, an English cleric and scholar published his theory on population growth and food supply which came to be known as Malthusian Doctrine. The principle states that if humans fail to control its population nature plays its role and brings down the level of population to the level of available food supply through checks like famine, earthquake, flood, war, disease and epidemic. Down the ages this was proved time and again when nature shortened the life of people.
On April 15, in his Ted Conference (an American media organisation) lecture, American business magnate and co-founder of Microsoft Bill Gates said in future, millions of human beings will not die of missile attack or war but from a severe and contagious virus, a sub microscopic infectious agent that replicates inside living host cells. He also said we spend millions on proliferation against a nuclear war but not enough to guard ourselves against a pandemic virus. How true he was when he sounded the alarm bell.
As the world battles today to curb the impact of corona virus the famous American actress Julia Roberts, who enthralled her audience with her onscreen presence, shared her thoughts in a video in collaboration with ‘Conversation International’ called ‘Nature is Speaking’. She may be quoted as saying, “Some call me Nature, others call me Mother Nature. I have been here for over four and half billion years, 22,500 times longer than you. I don’t really need people, but people need me. Yes, your future depends on me… How you choose to live each day, whether you regard or disregard me- doesn’t really matter me. One way or the other, your actions will determine your fate, Not mine.”
There is an uncanny silence today amid lockdown across the world. The virus is spreading very fast faster than we have imagined. With the escalating speed of the virus the entire world is at war with two different entities, one tangible and the other non tangible. The first one is Mother Nature and the second one is a sub-microscopic infectious virus.
As we confine and quarantine ourselves to our homes in a state of hibernation probably the time has come for nature to reboot, reclaim and occupy the land and sea. A cursory glance on the epicentre of corona virus reveals a surprising similarity among three Mediterranean countries of Spain, France and Italy where most of devastations were caused, lie between 40 degree and 60 degree north latitude.
A number of countries that surround these three countries like Portugal, the Netherlands, Belgium, Greece, Hungary, Austria to name a few, hardly suffered in comparison to these countries. New York state, where more than 26,000 deaths were reported also lies at 40 degree north latitude. The virus is spreading very fast, faster than we have imagined. We confine and quarantine ourselves to our homes in a state of hibernation.
In the 14th century when bubonic plague was ripping through Europe, Italy was no exception. In 1348, Venice was the first city to enforce an official quarantine. The practice began during the 14th century to prevent the coastal cities from plague epidemic. Any ship arriving at Venice from plague affected countries were required to anchor for 40 days in isolation. This practice, called quarantine, was derived from the Italian ‘quaranta gironi’ meaning 40 days. No one is quite sure why 40 days’ isolation was suggested. But scholars have found a rationale in Biblical references as Jesus’ fast for 40 days in the Judaean desert and the Christian observation of Lent, which comes before Easter. According to the Biblical story, Moses spent 40 days in Mount Sinai to receive Ten Commandments from God.
Commenting on the present crisis, the United Nations Environment Chief Inger Anderson warned that we are playing with fire and said, “Nature is sending us a message”.
Leading scientists say that COVID-19 outbreak was a ‘clear warning shot’. They urged the authorities to put an end to live animal markets which they called an “ideal mixing bowl” for disease. Recently, China has imposed a total ban on the consumption of dog and cat meat. Likewise, Vietnam also imposed a ban on wildlife trading.
A number of fake news, some real heartening news paper reports and visuals which went viral on social media actually prompted me to write this article. I was amused to see a video of dolphins swimming in the canals of Venice, which turned out to be a fake one as National Geographic reported that Venetian dolphins were actually filmed at a port in Sardinia, in the Mediterranean Sea, hundreds of miles away.
Canal water nonetheless is much clearer now due to less gondola activities. When the entire world is struggling to control the novel corona virus, fake news abounds on social media as corona virus overturns life, there is good news coming from the animal world too. In absence of humans amid countrywide lockdown and curfew, wildlife started reclaiming city spaces, which once belonged to them, across India. Wild animals were seen roaming freely without any human interference. There is a belief that nature has started to reclaim its territory on land and sea.
A newspaper report said there was a surprise visitor at Sector 22 of Chandigarh, a sambhar which strayed and trying to hide in the parking lot of the showrooms when the onlookers became curious. Some rare animals were spotted in city limits throughout India such as Nilgai outside GIP Mall at Noida, a critically endangered species, spotted Malabar civet cat seen until 1990 resurfaced for the first time in Calicut, a spotted deer running across the deserted streets of Dehradun, dolphins returning near Governor’s House in Mumbai, peacocks dancing in the streets of Mumbai, a leopard near Patna airport or an elephant strolling near Har Ki Pauri, Haridwar.
All these stories at this time of despair, helplessness and frustration taught us some lesson. Had Rudyard Kipling been alive today he would have been rewriting his epic adventure story, The Jungle Book, with Mowgli, the jungle boy as the central character. Nature has endured enough and through these animals nature has sent us a strong message to say ‘hey humans you better take a break now’!
This is a decisive moment in the history of mankind and this could be the moment for us to reboot our relationship with nature. In our endeavour, let all of us of the world community join in unison the famous American folk singer Pete Seeger and sing “We shall overcome, someday”.
(The author is
former head of the
Department of Geography,
St Edmund’s College)