Our dangerous blindness to the ocean

New Indian Express

5 hours ago

We are a civilisation that worships rivers but largely turns its back on the sea. For millennia, India's cultural imagination has flowed along the sacred courses of the Ganga and Yamuna. The vast ocean surrounding our peninsula remains, in our collective consciousness, little more than a blue blank space on the map.
This is more than an oversight -- it is a dangerous blindness. The truth we must confront is this: India's future will be written not just in the soil of our farmlands or the concrete of our cities, but in the rising waters of our warming seas.
The ocean has always been with us, even when we refused to see it. In school, we all learn about the water cycle, which starts and ends in the oceans. It is the ocean that breathes life into our monsoons and moderates the climate that shapes our lives. Its rhythms still dictate the success of our crops and the state of our economy.
Small-scale fishers joyously battle the waves and feed millions with a wide diversity of fish. A vast decentralised network of fish vendors transport fish to the coastal hinterlands. Not to forget the thousands of persons busy with a battery of ancillary marine services and industries on the coast. The ocean thus sustains millions of livelihoods along our 7,500 km coastline.
Yet until cyclones surge through our cities or fish prices skyrocket in our markets, we urban Indians, our policymakers in Delhi, and academics in landlocked universities, barely give the ocean a thought.
This ignorance comes at a cost. As I write, the Indian Ocean is warming faster than any other body of water on Earth. The same waters that gave us the monsoon system are now turning against us, becoming engines of climate chaos. Unpredictable rains, intensifying cyclones, disappearing fish stocks -- these are not distant concerns, but clear and present dangers to our national security, our food systems, our very way of life.
Yet there is hope in this crisis. The ocean that threatens us also holds solutions. Sustainable fisheries could nourish our growing population. Marine ecosystems can be our allies in carbon sequestration. Wind and waves can power our energy transition. But to harness this potential, we must first do what we have failed to do for centuries: develop a true relationship with our blue heritage.
This relationship must be built on three foundations:
First, we must expand our imagination of what ocean values mean to India. Beyond fish and ports and naval strategy, the sea is a socio-cultural touchstone.
The Karnataka fisherman singing to the waves as he sets his nets; the Gujarati shipwright crafting vessels using centuries-old techniques; the Odia grandmother telling stories of sea gods to her grandchildren; the family in Pondicherry enjoying a holiday snorkeling to observe the artificial reefs -- these are as much part of our ocean relationship as any industrial plan.
Second, we must democratise our ocean governance. Too often, decisions about our seas are made by those who are very distant and view them only as resources to extract or spaces to control. Our coastal panchayats, municipalities, and corporations (LSGs) need a greater say in the governance of at least four nautical miles out to sea.
Also, the traditional knowledge of fishing communities, the concerns of coastal residents, the visions of marine scientists - all must have equal weight in shaping policy. When a new port is planned or a fishing zone restricted, those most affected must have real voice in the decision.
Third, we must invest hugely in ocean justice. The ocean economy cannot be another arena where the powerful prosper while traditional users are displaced.
Consider the Koli navigators of Mumbai, who for 40 generations have read monsoon winds and currents to practice sustainable harvests. Their ancestral fishing calendars now clash with commercial trawling operations that ignore seasonal bans.
Then there are the Pattinavar pearl divers of Tamil Nadu, who free-dive to 20 meters without equipment, recover oysters using techniques unchanged since the Sangam era. Their sustainable practices are threatened by mechanised dredging.
The traditional ichthyologists of Kerala, elderly masters of marine biology who can identify 300+ species and their breeding cycles, are also seeing their knowledge vanishing as youth leave for cities.
A final example is of the women seaweed collectors of Goa, who harvest algae using lunar cycles, creating nutritious seaweed snacks while restoring marine biodiversity. The occupational and human rights of these, and numerous other niche livelihoods, must be protected as we develop new industries. Blue growth must not become blue grabbing.
The path forward is clear, though not easy. We must bring ocean literacy into our schools, so the next generation grows up understanding the sea that surrounds them. We must direct research funding to study not just ocean resources but ocean relationships. We must create platforms where scientists work with fishers, where policymakers listen to coastal communities and where our business leaders establish partnerships with conservationists.
This is not just about saving the ocean -- it is about saving ourselves. For a nation that prides itself on ancient wisdom, we have been remarkably slow to learn this simple truth: we are an ocean civilisation, whether we acknowledge it or not. The waves that lap our shores carry both warnings and opportunities. The question is whether we will finally pay attention.
As India stands on the brink of unprecedented development, we face a choice. We can continue our terrestrial myopia, treating the ocean as an afterthought until crisis forces our hand. Or we can embrace our blue heritage and ocean values, recognising that our future prosperity, our climate resilience, and even our cultural identity are all inextricably linked to the health of our seas.
The ocean has never abandoned us, even when we turned away. Now, as the planet changes around us, it is time we turned back - with wonder, with curiosity, with humility, and with the determination to build a relationship worthy of this magnificent, life-giving force that surrounds and sustains us all.
(John Kurien is a former Professor, Centre for Development Studies, Trivandrum, Kerala. He can be reached at [e-mail].)