IUCN / SSC Cat Specialist Group - Digital Cat Library |
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| Jalais, A. | |
| The Sundarbans: whose world heritage site? | |
| 2007 Conservation and Society (5): 1-8 | |
What I would like to dwell upon in this piece, through the contrasting images of fishermen being evicted from Jambudwip on the one hand and the Sahara India Group's advertisement of their project on 'virgin islands' on the other, are the implications, for the wider world, that humans do not or should not fit in the Sundarbans. The Sahara Group's projection of the Sundarbans is yet another representation, in a long list of representations, where the islanders of the Sundarbans are seen as superfluous. But the Sundarbans _are _not just forest or _jangol_, they are also an inhabited region or _abad. _I feel that we need to address the urge for omitting people from images and islands of the Sundarbans if we are to engage with the concern raised by Rangarajan and Shahabuddin-that of the need to have more knowledge sharing between biologists and social scientists (2006: 361). This is because the peddling of such images, whether for wildlife preservation or in current bids at rebranding the place for the purposes of global marketing, will increase the alienation between the inhabitants of the Sundarbans and its wildlife. |
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