2 days ago
Meet Morningstar Khongthaw, the man who grows bridges
We had been walking for over an hour—down a steep, moss-slicked staircase cut into the hillside of Rangthylliang, a remote village in Meghalaya's East Khasi Hills. The forest thickened with each step—bamboo groves pressed in close, their trunks darkened by rain, the sound of a stream somewhere below. And then, around a bend, it appeared. A bridge. Not built—grown.
Braided roots—some as thick as a thigh, others slender and pale—stretched 53 metres across a river gorge, from one bank to another. They coiled and twisted through the air like something alive. This was no ordinary structure. It was a living root bridge—a marvel of bioengineering shaped by hand over decades, even centuries, using the aerial roots of the Ficus elastica tree. What began as a sapling on either side of the stream had been trained, over generations, into this bridge. No nails. No cement. Just bamboo scaffolds, time, and quiet resolve. Together, they formed a span that felt like the forest folding in on itself to offer passage. 'This one," says a voice ahead of me, 'is still learning to walk."
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Morningstar Khongthaw, 29, is crouched near the bridge's edge, touching a pale, new root lashed to the bamboo guide. The founder of the Living Bridge Foundation, a community-driven initiative focused on preserving Meghalaya's living root bridges, points a few steps further to an older, hardened line of root now fused deep into the body of the bridge. 'That one, maybe 300 years. We don't build them. We raise them."
Barefoot and slight in frame, Khongthaw moves with the precision of someone who knows every knot and creak. He explains how roots are selected, how they're fed with compost from the forest floor, how each one is trained over monsoons and winters, checked, re-checked, then left to grow in its own time. He isn't a scientist or a civil engineer. He is a Khasi conservationist. A guardian of knowledge that lives in the hands and memory of a fading generation. 'I was six when I crossed this bridge for the first time," he says. 'Back then, it was just one root and two bamboo poles. My father carried me on his back."
That same bridge still stretches across the gorge—but it's no longer a single line. It has thickened with Khongthaw adding three or four new roots every year, each cared for until they fused into the structure. Now others cross it without hesitation. Tourists pose for photos. It's on the tentative Unesco world heritage site list. But he still remembers that first crawl: the way the root trembled, the river's sound below, and the quiet strength of his ancestors, and it's what drives him to save these living bridges.
QUIET INHERITANCE
As India nears its 100th year of independence, plans for highways, smart cities and bullet trains dominate the future narrative. But in the hills of Meghalaya, another blueprint persists; one dependent on strong roots. For generations, the Khasi and Jaiñtia tribes have grown bridges, living structures coaxed from rubber fig trees and passed down like heirlooms. But that quiet inheritance is at risk. Tourism moves faster than the roots. Policy arrives from the top down. And the knowledge— passed from uncle to nephew—is fading.
Khongthaw is trying to hold the line. He set up the foundation in 2018 to care for the root bridges, preserve knowledge of living root bridge construction, which he calls 'living architecture", and help young Khasis appreciate their heritage of interconnectedness with nature. The foundation has around 10 core members, mostly volunteers from local Khasi villages. They fund their work through small grants, community contributions, and occasionally, support from organisations like UNDP India.
'Root bridges are perhaps one of the most elegant examples of ecological intelligence and cultural heritage intertwined," says Sameer Shisodia, CEO of Rainmatter Foundation, which supports community-led conservation projects across India, but does not fund Living Bridge's work. 'Morningstar's approach shows us that meaningful innovation often lies in quietly enhancing traditions rather than forcing external solutions."
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Root bridges are just one expression of a wider tradition. Depending on the terrain, Khongthaw and his community shape living ladders up cliffs, tunnels through the forest, and swings woven into the canopy. 'If it's a rock face," he says, 'we don't need a bridge. We build something to climb." In some places, the aerial roots become scaffolds for play—suspended like vines from a Tarzan story. 'It's not just engineering," he says. 'It's adaptation."
A single bridge can take 25 years to mature, and once formed, it grows stronger, some lasting centuries. Today, more than 100 of them exist across the Khasi and Jaiñtia Hills.
It begins with a Ficus elastica sapling—an Indian rubber fig—chosen for its aerial roots that descend from branches and seek the ground. If the terrain allows, trees are planted on either side of the stream or gorge. 'First, you look at the stream," Khongthaw says. 'If there are no trees on either side, you plant." In the rainy season, when the roots are soft, they are gently bent and guided across the span using bamboo scaffolds, hollowed areca palm trunks or ropes. The bamboo structures are replaced annually as they decay. The roots are lashed in place with whatever is available: natural fibres, plastic cords, even aluminium wire.
'You don't touch the roots too early," he says. 'They'll snap. Three or four months old, they're too fragile. One or two years— that's when they become candidates."
Guiding the root is not a one-time action but a sustained relationship. The team returns each monsoon to weave, check growth, and layer compost. 'Rotten leaves, branches, old wood… we place it under the roots like something precious. That's how we feed it." There are no blueprints. No manuals. 'One uncle to another," he says. 'You grow up near a bridge, you start helping and grow more of them."
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A bridge is never finished. It may take 10 years before it holds weight. Twenty-five to be strong. Fifty to endure. 'We don't stop weaving," Khongthaw says. 'Even after you walk on it. Even after it holds." Every bridge is a collaboration—not just between roots, but between people. One person starts. Another finishes. 'It's inheritance."
In Khasi myth, there's a golden bridge of roots, jingkieng ksiar, which once linked earth to heaven. Khongthaw gestures toward the trees. 'It's in the stories," he says. 'When a bridge grows weak, we plant a young ficus on top of the mother tree. When she dies, the child is already growing." Even endings, here, are designed to carry on.
TURNING POINT
In 2013, when he was still a school student, a Doordarshan crew arrived in Rangthylliang to film the elders and their stories. Khongthaw was asked to help. For the first time, he saw the bridges through a different lens. They weren't just crossings. They could be destinations. Other places were already being promoted—the double-decker in Nongriat, the one in Mawlynnong. 'I thought we could do the same here," he says. But the more he explored those tourist sites, the more unsettled he became. The noise. The footfall. The bridges roped off and rotting under crowds. The visitors who came for photos, not stories. 'It became a turning point," he says. 'Before we promote, we need to learn how to protect."
He started visiting elders again—for instruction. How did they guide the roots? How did they feed them? 'I learned the ficus is a keystone tree," he says. They help the water table, prevent landslides, and act as both anchor and climate shield. 'Even a lone ficus supports life—birds, squirrels, insects, people."
From a boy chasing a tourism dream he became a quiet conservationist. 'I wanted to protect what we had," he says. But it all came together sometime in August or September 2018 when he heard about a bridge that had fallen. The tree in Pynursla, a neighbouring village, belonged to Ba-Bli Khongthani, nearly 90 and bedridden. Since the bridge had fallen, they were considering cutting the tree. Khongthaw knew what he had to do. He drafted an agreement to formally transfer ownership of the tree and had it typed up. That evening, Khongthaw, a village elder, and Willem Betts, a Canadian friend, walked to Ba-Bli's home.
Khongthaw described his vision—to nurture the tree as a symbol for future generations. 'If you really want to take care of the tree, then it's yours," Ba-Bli said with a smile. Without ceremony, Khongthaw presented the agreement. Years later, he would laminate this document and preserve it like an heirloom. That day Khongthaw felt a profound sense of relief. Yes, a bridge had fallen— but something deeper had been strengthened. Ownership had passed from one generation to another, with a promise and trust.
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Another giant ficus has changed his life. 'It was going to be cut for charcoal," he says. The tree was over 400 years old. Its aerial roots had been guided into two bridges. But the family that owned it needed money. 'I couldn't let it go." He borrowed ₹5,000. 'That's all it cost. A sacred tree. A living bridge."
The canopy now hosts a bamboo ladder that rises into the branches—a vertical scaffold, temporary, handmade. This time, the roots won't be guided down into a bridge. They'll be shaped inward, into a circle. 'Not for people to look at," he says. 'For us to stay. Sleep. Live in." He calls it his 'Avatar Tree", in reference to the Hometree in James Cameron's Avatar.
THE CHALLENGES
Despite the community's involvement and understanding of their unique heritage, there are challenges. He recalls one bridge being cut down because a man didn't want it near his farmland. In another clearing, a half-grown bridge was slashed after a feud between neighbours. Khongthaw doesn't argue. He returns with stories. He sits with the elders and asks, 'What did the bridge do wrong?" He reminds them to watch the forest more closely. How roots seek each other, how they grow stronger by holding. 'The bridge never divides. It connects."
The loss of his mentor was another hit. 'Jalong Khomola dedicated his whole life to root bridges," Khongthaw recalls. Their relationship began in 2015 at village meetings near Khomola's orange orchard. Khomola moved barefoot through the forests, scaling ficus trees to gather saplings, each destined to become a bridge. He also married tradition with innovation, using plastic irrigation pipes instead of open bamboo scaffolds to water the roots and help them grow faster, and patiently taught Khongthaw all these techniques. In October 2022, Khomola, nearly 80, fell from a tree. He died shortly afterwards, but Khongthaw is carrying on his legacy.
Khongthaw's original team of 30 has thinned to five. 'Some needed jobs. Others wanted faster change. This work doesn't offer either." In 2022, the monsoon came early. Rivers swelled. Five bridges were washed away. Khongthaw didn't mourn. 'When a bridge falls," he says, 'you don't ask why. You start weaving again." So far, Khongthaw and his team have mapped 133 bridges across Meghalaya. 'Still more to discover," he says. Many remain unnamed, tucked inside forests.
THIS IS MEMORY
In 2019, the state government came with a proposal to put Meghalaya's living root bridges on Unesco's World Heritage list. On the surface, it looked like recognition. To Khongthaw, it sounded like a warning. The plan barely involved the people who raised the bridges. No elders were consulted. No weavers invited. 'How can you write policy," he asks, 'if you don't even know what inosculation is?" he says, referring to the natural process of two trees fusing and growing into one.
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What troubled him wasn't heritage recognition, but how it was imposed. A template from elsewhere, dropped on to a landscape with its own rhythm, its own sacred groves. 'We already had rules," he says. 'Our clans made them in 1939. You cut a tree, you paid a fine. We didn't wait for Unesco to tell us what was sacred." He refused to endorse the plan. Instead he gathered elders, youth and landowners from eight clans. He asked them to look at the bridges and the way they grow. 'No root dominates. No hand forces. We all weave." To make his point, he referenced the jingkieng ksiar story every Khasi child knows. 'This isn't tourism," he says. 'It's memory. It's instruction. It's ours."
Officials called him difficult. Some said he was politicising trees. But Khongthaw wasn't against recognition; he was against erasure. 'We don't want fences," he says. 'We want responsibility. That's what makes a bridge last."
COMMUNITY EFFORT
Khongthaw bends over a sapling barely a foot tall. Around it, bamboo scaffolds rise like skeletal bridges-in-waiting. This is where his Project 2047 begins.
Project 2047 is Khongthaw's vision to plant and nurture 30 new root bridges across Meghalaya by 2047, when India will mark 100 years of independence. He involves the larger community—village elders, students and volunteers—in planting, maintaining and documenting these bridges, aiming to pass traditional knowledge to younger generations and revive Law Kyntang, the sacred groves protected by community law and oral memory. 'It takes 25, maybe 30 years (for a root bridge to mature)," Khongthaw says. 'So we start now. When India turns 100, these bridges will be strong."
Since 2022, 30 bridges have been planted and raised with the help of village elders, students and barefoot engineers. Khongthaw calls it 'design, build, grow". A phrase he repeats often, sometimes to schoolchildren, sometimes to funders sceptical of a project whose return lies decades ahead. 'The bridge doesn't belong to me," he says. 'It belongs to the child who will cross it when I'm gone." He's working with local schools, encouraging students to adopt nearby bridges, guiding them through root weaving, asking them to track growth and sketch what they see. 'Not everyone will stay," he says, referring to migration from the region for work and studies. 'But some will. And that's enough."
Traditionally, only old, unmarried men were allowed to plant ficus trees. 'You had to be over 50," he says. Khongthaw ignored it and planted 25 saplings. 'Belief is important," he says. 'But belief in yourself is more important. My legacy is the belief that young people can shape tradition. That we don't have to wait until we're 50 and alone to start planting trees. We can begin now—and someone else will finish."
He walks the hills almost daily—sometimes alone, sometimes with visitors, often with a bundle of bamboo tied over his shoulder. He greets elders. He checks saplings. Project 2047 is a slow, quiet defiance in a world too quick to build and too reluctant to tend. 'When they ask what development looks like," Khongthaw says, 'we can point to this. A root in the ground. A bridge above a river. Still growing."
Pankaj Mishra is a journalist and co-founder of FactorDaily, reporting on the intersections of technology, environment, and culture.
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