Nature Matters

Sailendra Nath Ghosh falls in that rare class of individuals the world recognises as "public intellectuals". His departure from mother earth in 2013 - at the ripe old age of 90 - brought to an end a prolific writing career spanning four decades during which he examined the wisdoms and follies behind an entire gamut of contentious, public interest issues: biotechnology, ecology, ideology (from Marx to Gandhi), oil-based civilization, western models of industrialisation, agriculture, India's constitution, education, communalism and racism.

The present selection is an attempt to present a wide spectrum of his writings on purely environmental issues ranging from large dams and nuclear reactors, to organic agriculture and the need for an ecology-based developmental philosophy.

Ghosh wrote with complete candour, competence and zest and a total absence of malice. His insights will light the way for those who continue to seek genuine solutions to the environmental problems plaguing our time.

As Satish Kumar says in his introduction, "These essays are a rare feast for the mind"