HYDERABAD: Swami Shitikantananda of the Ramakrishna Math has said that the root cause for imbalance in the Panchabhutas, resulting in climate change was the decline of ‘dharma’, which has a connection with life.
Addressing the inaugural ceremony of the two-day national seminar on ‘Harnessing the potential of Panchabhutas (Earth, water, fire, wind and space) for sustainable climate resilient rainfed agriculture’ held at the Central Research Institute for Dryland Agriculture (CRIDA) campus at Santoshnagar on Wednesday, Shitikantananda said that in Indian culture, Panchabhutas were never treated as inanimate. However, the western society’s attitude towards the five elements of nature (earth, water, fire, wind and space) has always leaned towards exploiting them.
“Just like we have the right to live, honeybees, earthworms, butterflies and even microorganisms have the same right. What we are doing by indiscriminately using chemical pesticides is violence on the nature, which is a sin for which we will have to pay heavily,” he said. In an interconnected life, it is our duty to protect other species and revive our age-old principles of ‘Vasudaiva Kutumbakam’ and ‘Jeevo Jeevasya Jeevanam’, Swami Shitikantananda said.
Dr MC Varshneya, former vice-chancellor of Kamadhenu University and Anand Agricultural University, opined that when Panchabhutas are in harmonious balance, crop production is bountiful. “Climate change is one such disruptor that alters the ‘energy’ in the plant environment and the balancing of the panchabhutas neutralises the impacts of climate change, which will lead to climate resilient agriculture,” he opined.
Dr Dinesh Kulkarni, general secretary of Bharatiya Kisan Sangh, disagreed with the opinion that organic farming was the root cause of Sri Lanka’s devastated economy. “Sri Lanka’s agreements with China were not feasible, the pandemic affected its tourism sector. Its decision to stop importing fertilisers were the reasons for the country’s economic slump,” he said.