"Riverine relations and environmental subjectivity in Kerala"
Speaker : Dr Sony R K
Associate Fellow, Adaptation and Resilience, Sustainable Futures Collaborative, New Delhi
@ : sony@sustainablefutures.org
Chairperson : Dr Ashish Mathew George
BhuSampada Center, NIAS
@ :ashish.george@nias.res.in
Date : 11th June, 2026
Time : 10.30 AM
Venue : Conference Hall
Abstract: Why do some people dedicate their lives to protecting a river, often at a personal cost? In this talk, I explore how environmental subjectivity — the sense of oneself as someone who cares about and acts to protect the environment — emerges among people living alongside two heavily polluted rivers in Kerala. Focusing on struggles around the Periyar River in Eloor and the Chalakudy River in Kathikudam, I examine how experiences of pollution reshape people’s relationship with their surroundings and draw them into grassroots environmental activism.
For many residents, rivers were not simply natural resources but part of everyday life, memory, livelihood, and social relationships. People grew up bathing, fishing, washing clothes, and spending time along these rivers. As industrial pollution intensified through toxic waste, fish deaths, poisoned wells, foul smells, and growing
health concerns, these familiar riverscapes became spaces of loss and anxiety. In response, many local residents, including women, farmers, workers, and youth, began organising collectively to protect the rivers they considered inseparable from their lives.
Drawing on conversations with activists and local communities, I argue that environmental subjectivity does not emerge only through formal discourse, scientific knowledge, or state policies. It is also shaped through emotions, memories, lived experiences, and participation in everyday struggles. The talk reflects on what Kerala’s movements against industrial pollution reveal about ecological loss, care, and the deep human connections that sustain environmental action.
About the speaker: Sony R K is an Associate Fellow in the Adaptation and Resilience vertical at the Sustainable Futures Collaborative (SFC). He works at the intersection of conservation, development, and action, with research interests spanning environmentalism, environmental politics and justice, agroecology, and climate adaptation and resilience.
Previously, he was a Senior Manager at the Food and Land Use Coalition (FOLU) at World Resources Institute India, where he led initiatives on sustainable and regenerative agriculture, nature-based solutions, and food systems transformation.