Nature

Mountain Farmers of Sikkim-Darjeeling Dealing with COVID & Nature

Although Darjeeling and Kalimpong districts of West Bengal and the state of Sikkim have been projected predominantly as tourist sites, the mainstay of the rural population continues to be agriculture. According to Census 2011, the majority of the population here are rural (60.58% in Darjeeling-Kalimpong & 75.03% in Sikkim) and agriculture is the main occupation. Here farming communities depend on wage labour, small businesses and tourism (homestays) to augment their income from agriculture and all these were also closed during the lockdown period.


When Nature Reclaims Territory

Natural phenomenon often brings huge devastations and cause a tremendous hazard in our lives and properties. We have seen numerous examples of the fury of nature in the form of Volcanoes, Earthquakes, Cyclones, Landslides, Avalanches, Flood and Tsunami, etc. Man-made disasters are of much smaller scales and less destructive. However, large scale implications of human actions on the environment are often overlooked.