As a schoolboy, my father used to pass through serene agricultural fields along with forest patches on the way to his school. He used to play hide and seek in those fields while returning home. He saw everybody from the family helping and working in the field. But now, things have changed a lot. As we visit our ancestral village now, seeing the tall buildings and extensive road networks wonders me about the rapid changes that have taken place. The beautiful terrace paddy field is rapidly declining from the hills. This is why I am here to briefly explore the importance of protection and preservation of agricultural land. My main focus will be on Sikkim. In this article, I kept in mind to address the theme of World Environment Day 2024 i.e. “Our Land Our Future”.
When people think of farming or dedicating their life to agriculture, the first question that comes to their mind is, is it good enough job to earn a livelihood, become rich and command respect? It might be partially true that farmers have to face lots of challenges due to hardships involved in farming. Similarly, there are many other lucrative ventures which probably gives better returns, although on short term basis. Since Sikkim follows organic farming, the farmers tend to have issues with diseases and pests that damage their crops. Once the crops get ruined, farmers get frustrated, forcing them to sell their land and get profit in the short term. After selling their land, farmers have a tendency to move to urban areas searching for profitable jobs. It might sound easy but getting descent jobs in this competitive era is really tough. Additionally, urban life is challenging for lower-middle class people whose earning is minimal. There are many other issues such as shortage of water, deprived sunlight and clean air, etc. Despite of hardship, farming is advantageous in the long run. The serene environment of the villages and rural areas will be completely unavailable in the urban areas. Moreover, agriculture community live in a harmonious society with rich culture and tradition, which is not found in the multicultural environment of cities and towns.
Hence, selling agricultural land and becoming rich for some years might appear glamorous, but it’s the most foolish activity. We really need to make farmers aware of the importance of owning agricultural land. The land, once sold or converted for non-agricultural purposes, cannot be restored back at any cost. Not only do they lose their farmland, but also their ancestral inheritance. In Sikkim, the land is mostly sold for industrial purposes such as hydro power projects, pharmaceutical industries and hotel business. The density of hydro power projects in Sikkim is the highest in Asia and most part of the projects are built in productive agricultural lands, which are in a way indigenously managed and heritage of the area. The pace of such unsustainable development will lead to a complete disappearance of farmland and our traditional way of farming e.g.-terrace rice cultivation, farm-based dry agricultural practices and diverse agro-forestry systems. Government, local communities and farmers should get inspired by good agricultural ideas from the Satoyama initiative practiced in Japan with a concept of “society in harmony with nature” and come forward to make a collaborative effort to make agriculture sustainable and lucrative.
After Sikkim became a part of India in 1975, it was agreed by the Government of India and the then Monarchy of Sikkim to give full protection to old laws. One of the most significant law states that people who have a Sikkim Subject or their direct descendants are the only ones allowed to buy land or can own landed property. Since it has been quite some time after Sikkim was integrated to the Indian Union, such old laws are slowly getting diluted. Now people from outside Sikkim are allowed to buy land in the urban areas of Gangtok. With the current pace of rapid globalization, huge influx of people from the plains and vanishing old laws, the land of Sikkim, especially heritage agricultural land, will have ill consequences very soon. Most of the heritage land, even in the rural areas, doesn’t have much time to be replaced by big industries. If we don’t realize this now, then all of Sikkim is going to be industrialized by the time we pay attention to this rapid unsustainable change. If enough attention is not given on time, Sikkim will have a miserable fate like any other hill states of India. Hence, I really wanted to make everyone aware of this issue, so that we all can slowly make a change in order to protect our ancestral land leading to the protection of environment, culture, laws and traditions. I want to end my appeal by retelling old idiom of Nepali -
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which translates as “The job of service holder lasts for one generation while business lasts for hundred generations but agriculture lasts for a thousand generations.”
