The topographical formation of the present-day Mumbai is a result of its colonial past wherein after several land reclamation projects, an archipelago of seven islands, turned into a unified landmass that kept expanding leading to the creation of ‘Brihanmumbai’ or sprawling city of greater Mumbai. The erstwhile island city is flanked by the sea on one side and lakes, creeks as well as forests spot the remaining land which are under constant threats of encroachment because of ongoing projects of urbanization. One such forest land is Aarey forest, an eco-sensitive zone, home to several tribal folk who practice the world renowned Warli art, located in the northern suburbs along the coastline in the Sanjay Gandhi National Park which is in danger owing to the construction of metro railway, a step towards so called ‘urbanisation’. #SaveAareyForest, #SaveAarey, #AareyStopHypocrisy, a chain of hashtags was initiated on social media platforms to garner online support for the movement that apart from the common people’s collective, was also backed by groups of rap, hiphop and several other artists. The movement gained further momentum when Swadesi, a band of multilingual hiphop artists released a song, ‘The Warli Revolt’, featuring Prakash Bhoir, chieftain of the Warli tribe. The song galvanized several voices of resistance from the tribal community, challenged the establishment and forced the judiciary to implement a stay order on the construction for the time being. Rap or hiphop is a genre that has recently become quite popular in the modern suburbs of India, using this form to record the tribal folk’s narrative of resistance further illustrates how the divide between the city and the countryside is being disrupted. Unlike the first wave of ecocriticism, the song shows how nature is an integral component of culture, this paper discusses how the boundaries between nature and non-nature are being constantly challenged. Using the framework of cultural criticism and ecocriticism, the paper will attempt to redefine concepts ‘urban’, ‘rural’, ‘city’, ‘forest’ and question what George Simmel calls ‘metropolitan individuality’ in the age of social media activism while analysing the song ‘The Warli Revolt’.
Keywords: metropolis, urban, tribal, rural, ecocriticism, social media, disruption
“Aarey colony, located to the south of Mumbai’s Sanjay Gandhi National Park, is a 1,300-hectare forested expanse widely described as the city’s last remaining “green lung”. It is home to 27 Adivasi[1] villages, at least nine leopards and nearly five lakh trees.” (Express News Service) In the first week of October 2019, around two thousand trees were cut by the Mumbai Metro Rail Corporation Limited in order to build a metro car shed in Aarey Forest. However, this act was instantly met with a lot of resistance by environmental activists, artists, local residents and by various politicians; several petitions were filed and the matter was taken to the court. In the initial phases of the case, the Bombay High Court did not acknowledge Aarey as a forest contrary to the locals’ demand for Aarey to be declared as a protected area. The protests soon gathered nationwide traction and transformed into a movement. As a result, the Supreme Court took suo motu[2] cognizance of the matter. Swadesi, multilingual group of hip-hop artists, in collaboration with the Prakash Bhoir, the chieftain of the Warli[3] tribe residing in these forests launched their single ‘The Warli Revolt’ earlier that year which became an anthem for this movement. Not only does their song recount trials and travails of the lives of tribal folk but it also echoes their voices in a vernacular language, Marathi. The first major modern Warli revolt, which was registered in the annals of national history, was held almost seventy-six years ago during the colonial regime when tribal peasants fought for minimum wages and abolition of slavery and bonded labour. (Prasad) It was during the colonial regime that the adivasis who had so far enjoyed ‘the usufructus[4] rights which allowed them to obtain all the produce they required for domestic and agricultural purposes from the public forests’ (Heredia, Dandekar 5)were made tenants of the land and had to work as labourers so that they would not starve to death after the colonial penetration. With the creation of property rights, the Warlis were further dispossessed. Until 1945-50, their resistances were quelled and did not lead to much consequence. It was the law enforcement authorities and politicians deciding what was to be called ‘forest’ and whether it could continue to remain their homeland. Almost seven and half decades later, there hasn’t been a major change and Warlis still continue to remain marginalised even though their artform has been munificently appropriated by the mainstream fashion and art industry. After the independence, some provisions such as affirmative action in educational institutions and to some degree even in professions have been created for the tribal community but their cultural attitudes, beliefs and practices have not been taken account leading to minimal or negligible acculturation. This blind pursuit of development and modern education shows how ‘indigenous ways of knowing or knowledge production’ are not valued. (Woynarski) Although Warli art might have left an indelible imprint on the national consciousness, the voices of the Warlis seldom reach the national platform.
A Forest in the Megapolis
Swadesi’s song The Warli Revolt breaks away from the structure of traditional Warli protests that have happened so far as the protest to save Aarey Forest garnered popular attention and was participated in by not just the tribal folk but people from across the city as well as different classes. The song thus becomes a catalysing agent galvanising the masses and the activists alike. Thus, it is limpid unlike a metropolis which as Simmel proposes is dominated by objectivism, the whole city came together to stop the state from building a car shed. The forest, therefore, is not seen as an external entity but is an integral part of the cityscape. In his essay The Trouble with Wilderness, William Cronon debunks the idea of wilderness being purest form of nature; on the contrary, he establishes how wilderness too is a cultural construct and due to its resources or ‘tradable commodities’, it cannot remain away from capitalist forces. He avers that wilderness, “… is entirely a creation of the culture that holds it dear, a product of the very history it seeks to deny. Indeed, one of the most striking proofs of the cultural invention of wilderness is its thoroughgoing erasure of the history from which it sprang.”(Cronon)
The song thus brought together the counter-hegemonic voices of the protestors and for the first time in the history of Warli protests, an indigenous voice, Prakash Bhoir, shared the popular platform as he too features in the song and has a significant role in its production thus breaking the outsider-insider barrier, the fact that such a space exists within the metropolis and there is frequent traffic between the forest and the city.
Fig.1. ‘The Warli Revolt’ © Swadesi ft. Praksh Bhoir/ Artwork © Dinesh Barap : A Glimpse
City’s Green Lungs or Mother Nature
Aarey forest is a classic example of departure from the western trope of wilderness as a place of pastoral retreat or sanctuary. It is more like an oasis which is surrounded by a metropolis and is occasionally, if not frequently, forayed by the city dwellers. As a result, the forest is not just home to the tribal folk or flora and fauna of the forest, but what many people during the protest have called it ‘green lungs’ of the city. Owing to this dual status, the protest to save Aarey Forest garnered support not only from the members of the tribe but also the urban locals. This kind of protest culture is in direct contradiction to what Simmel refers to as ‘blasé’ attitude, the peculiar psychic attribute of the metropolitans.
With urbanisation and democratisation of the country, the grand project of assimilation of the tribespeople into middle peasantry began. The systemic violence done to adivasis wherein government projects have led to instances of land grabbing and dehumanization has riled them up and this song acts as a clarion call reflecting the ferocity of the first adivasi leader, Tilka Manjhi, who will not be beguiled by the fake promises of politicians reinforce their wild side threatens to use violence to stop the authorities from cutting down trees and rendering them as well as the birds and animals homeless. Tilka Manjhi’s rebellion is yet another erased chapter from the national history which this song alludes to, thereby transcending regional boundaries and evoking tribal propinquity across the nation. ‘We must be united’ was the slogan of Manjhi to unite the members of the Santhal tribe against the exploitation of Britishers two years after the drought around 1770.( Chaudhury
) Swadesi calls upon the descendants of Tilka Manjhi to raise in unison against the barbaric assault on nature. The song also inverts the vilifying gaze of the educated elite who look down upon their houses as shanties and slums and edifies them about the dire consequences of their thoughtless deeds as they deprive the next generation of green environment.
Fig. 2. Tilka Manji © Sabrangindia
Contemporary Vernacular Rap ft. the Warli Voice
The hip-hop genre seems to be the most apt for ‘The Warli Revolt’ considering its evolution as an underground cultural movement with homemade distribution used to assert one’s identity particularly for those who had no other means to express themselves. The only difference being that unlike hip-hop movement the epicentre of the song was located in a forest and not just the suburbs of the modern city. Swadesi, a multi-lingual hip-hop band, generally addresses social issues through their songs and this song inadvertently served as an anthem for a protest that has the potential to transform into a movement against the blatant atrocities committed in name of progress and development by cutting down forests. The song is almost a war cry against the not so obvious collusion between the politicians and the bourgeoisie who for their ‘hefty sums’ or ‘profits’ deprive the adivasis of their forest-their home, their life and demand proof of their ownership of the land. This song in a way proves to be the testimony of their ownership as the law and other political players refuse to believe and dismiss them as ‘slum dwellers’. The law of forest takes over the law of city and the Warlis are judges who give an ultimatum: “But evil goons from villages nearby destroyed everything around. If anyone dare repeat this crime again, they will be buried right then and there!” (“The Warli Revolt ft Prakash Bhoir | Swadesi | Azadi Records (AZR012)” 03:15–05:21)
The song is self-reflexive as its acoustic performance incorporates the fundamental symbols from the life of a Warli. The circularity of the tribal temporality instead of the linearity of the modern time is shown in the video where snippets from their lives are showcased in radial zoom ins and zoom outs . Another commonality between hip-hop music and the lives of Warlis is the cyclical aspect. Just like the loop is an integral aspect of the rap music, cyclicity defines the tribal temporality, “For the Warlis, time is akin to a circle with cycles within cycles repeating themselves endlessly.” (Singh et al. 2)The dance that they perform mimics their notion of time; Tarpa, a form of tribal dance, is performed on several occasions or celebrations. The figures and traditional motifs are very repetitive and highly symbolic. When looked at closely, they have a light singing and swirling movement, describing their daily activities. And so do hip-hop artists who dance and sing in order to express their ideas and thoughts. Just like rap artists practice loop making, similarly Warli folk dance in spirals as shown in the video too. Their language too is a blend of several languages just like the multilingual band. Consequently, music seems to bridge the urban and tribal divide. The hip-hop convention of ‘diss’ addresses this aspect as it calls out its oppressors, “You politicians are sweet talking scum… .” Again following the conventions of the genre, expletives ‘balding, toothless swine’ to refer to the chauvinist goons who unlike the tribal community do not know how to respect women. Thus, the society that they inhabit is more egalitarian in contrast to the urban society residing in the metropolis(counter questioning the notion that modern educational institutions are for the welfare of society ) as it treats women with respect without objectifying them. Besides, it is also bioegalatarian as they treat nature like a mother and the animals as their brothers and the feline God ‘Waghoba’ as their deity and not a predator to be caged, the sky and the earth are both imbued with life.
Fig.3. Waghoba: The Feline God © Swadesi ft. Praksh Bhoir/ Artwork © Dinesh Barap
Creative Disruption and its Aftermath
‘The Warli Revolt’ is an unabashed proclamation of the adivasi identity and presents a musical biograph of Warli ‘adivasi’ or the original inhabitant of the forest since the time this place was absolute wilderness, they cultivated the land and practised subsistence farming. The voice of Warli makes it incontrovertible that they share a filial relationship with nature and extend the same kinship the wildlife and all the other natural forces. ‘Jungle’s life, jungle’s food, jungle’s power’ and that they are not afraid to save their jungle, their biocentric culture built on mutual respect of their surroundings as well as the members of their tribe who live in absolute harmony like brothers and sisters thus one can observe the divide between animate and non-animate getting blurred and eventually decimated. Notwithstanding the forest’s age old existence, the court’s initial verdict that did not acknowledge the vicinity, where the metro car shed was to be built, as a forest, shows the underlying capitalist assumptions made about ecology which is vehemently attacked by, to use Jonathan Bueller’s term, the environmental imagination of the Swadesi band. The convenient justification offered by the authorities for cutting trees was that in the near future in order to compensate, more number of trees would be planted elsewhere. This outlook reflects the anthropocentric belief of the administrative system at large which fails to discern that when forests are being cut it is not just the plants or tribal folk staying there, who are in danger but also the animals, birds and other animate objects. Unlike the Warlis , the law-making officials and the state itself failed to take into account what David Abram refers to as ‘more-than-human matrix of sensations and sensibilities.’ Highlighting the importance of interdependence of humanity on nature, he further states, “Our bodies have formed themselves in delicate reciprocity with the manifold textures, sounds, and shapes of an animate earth. … To shut ourselves off from these other voices, to continue by our lifestyles to condemn these other sensibilities to the oblivion of extinction, is to rob our own senses of their integrity, and to rob our minds of their coherence. We are human only in contact, and conviviality, with what is not human.” (Abram 9 ) The song too reverberates with the same notion of joy and companionship as translated in the lines :“In our jungle, we give and take respect. Dancing together hand in hand. Tarpas and drums our Warli band, our words dance through the land. Our women and children are brave. We all live like brothers and sisters now, just like we did before.” (“The Warli Revolt ft Prakash Bhoir | Swadesi | Azadi Records (AZR012)” 03:15–05:21)
Swadesi’s rendering of a Warli’s voice along with the efforts of environmental activists and the city dwellers proved to be a creative disruptive act as the state government has directed officials to look for an alternate site for the car shed and adjoining metro projects. It is owing to the popular support that the movement garnered over social media as well as other platforms combined with the pressure built by several petitioners that the Supreme Court intervened and six hundred acres of land in Aarey colony is now reserved as forest. This is more than a modest milestone and ‘The Warli Revolt’ shows how ambivalent the divide between nature and culture or city and forest is and that there is a need to revise as well as reinstate a more inclusive definition of progress.
Fig.4. Save Aarey Forest © Swadesi Movement
Works Cited
Abram, David. The Spell of the Sensuous: Perception and Language in a More-Than-Human World. Vintage, 1997.
Chaudhury, Sujit. “Tilka Manjhi.” AID, 7 Aug. 2018, aidindia.org/tilka-manjhi. https://aidindia.org/tilka-manjhi/
Cronon, William. “The Trouble with Wilderness; or, Getting Back to the Wrong Nature.” Www.Williamcronon.Net, 1996, www.williamcronon.net/writing/Trouble_with_Wilderness_Main.html#fn-42.
Express News Service. “NGO Seeks Action from IUCN: Aarey Forest Home to Nine Leopards.” The Indian Express, 8 Sept. 2019, indianexpress.com/article/cities/mumbai/ngo-seeks-action-from-iucn-aarey-forest-home-to-nine-leopards-5978009.
Heredia, Rudolf C., and Ajay Dandekar. “Warli Social History: An Introduction.” Economic and Political Weekly, vol. 35, no. 50, Economic and Political Weekly, 2000, pp. 4428–36, http://www.jstor.org/stable/4410060.
Prasad, Archana. “75 Years of the Historic Warli Revolt.” Mayday.Leftword.Com, 23 May 2020, mayday.leftword.com/blog/post/75-years-of-the-historic-warli-revolt.
https://mayday.leftword.com/blog/post/75-years-of-the-historic-warli-revolt
Simmel, Georg. “‘The Metropolis and Mental Life.’” The Urban Sociology Reader (Routledge Urban Reader Series), edited by Jan Lin and Christopher Mele, 2nd ed., Routledge, 2012, pp. 11–20.
Singh, Roma, et al. Design Case Study Visual World of Warli an Itneractive E-Book. IDC, IIT Bombay, 0000, dsource.in/case-study/visual-world-warli.
“The Warli Revolt ft Prakash Bhoir | Swadesi | Azadi Records (AZR012).” YouTube, uploaded by Swadesi Movement, 31 Jan. 2019, www.youtube.com/watch?v=sYADNgIkelY&feature=youtu.be.
“Tilak Manjhi: One of India’s First Freedom Fighters.” SabrangIndia, 2021, sabrangindia.in/article/tilak-manjhi-one-indias-first-freedom-fighters.
Wikipedia contributors. “Warli.” Wikipedia, 8 July 2021, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warli.
Woynarski, Lisa. “Locating an Indigenous Ethos in Ecological Performance.” Performing Ethos: International Journal of Ethics in Theatre & Performance, vol. 5, no. 1, 2015, pp. 17–30. Crossref, doi:10.1386/peet.5.1-2.17_1.
[1] an original inhabitant
[2] on its own motion
[3] The Warli or Varli are an indigenous tribe (Adivasi) of western India, living in mountainous as well as coastal areas along the Maharashtra-Gujarat border and surrounding areas.(Wikipedia contributors)
[4] A temporary legal right to use and derive income or benefit from someone else’s property.