Echoes of Eco

May, 2015

Vivekananda Kendra- nardep Newsletter

Vol:7 No:3

Bio-Diversity of Rameshwaram
In this issue:

Bio-Diversity of Rameshwaram
The Happenings-I
From our Publications
Visions of Wisdom:

Eco-Ethics
Eco-Empathy
Eco-Spirituality

Existence is Water
Concretized

The water is the source of joy and

for living a healthy life. It
is the immediate cause of all organic
beings such as vegetations, insects,
worms, birds, animals, men etc. Even
the mountains, the earth, the
atmosphere and heavenly bodies are
water concretized
- Chandogya Upanishad 7.10.1

Service to humanity is the highest form of worship Swami Vivekananda

If the nature of the work is properly appreciated and applied, it will stand in the same relation
to the higher faculties as food is to the physical body. It nourishes and enlivens the higher man
and urges him to produce the best he is capable of. It directs his freewill along the proper
course and disciplines the animal in him into progressive channels J_C_Kumarappa

The Gulf of Mannar :

Bio-diversity
The Gulf of Mannar region
provides

very

interesting

heterogeneous group of flora

and fauna. From this region
about 3600 species have been
identified. Of this, 186 species
are commercially exploited, 116
are

vulnerable

and

are

considered as endangered. In
the case of fishes of the 2200
fish species distributed in Indian
waters, 441 species have so far
been

recorded

in

Gulf

of

Mannar. Gulf of Mannar is one

of the best regions in the Indian
region

in

fish

biodiversity

richness.

The above are excerpts from the book on Biodiversity published by VK-nardep with
support from the WaSH programme of UNICEF. It provides an overall insight into
the concept of bio-diversity and how it is very important to the Gulf of Mannar
region. The fact that the real wellbeing and development of the society in a region is
organically related to the healthy bio-diversity of the region cannot be
overemphasized. Rameshwaram island being situated in the Gulf of Mannar biodiversity hot-spot can exert human-activity based influence on the Gulf of Mannar
bio-diversity. The extent of awareness about the regions bio-diversity and its
relation to the livelihood and safety of this ancient town will make the influence that
much positive for the posterity of human beings as well as other inhabitants of the
planet. For more information on Green Rameshwaram please contact: Secretary,
Vivekananda Kendra-nardep, Vivekanandapuram, Kanyakumari -629702
Email: vknardep@gmail.com Phone: 04652-246296 www.vknardep.org
Echoes of Eco - Newsletter, Vivekananda Kendra nardep, May 2015, Vol. 7 No: 3

Everything is connected to everything else,

Everything must go somewhere,
Nature knows best, and
Nothing comes from nothing.
-Barry Commoner

Happenings this month:

SUSTAINABLE
AGRICULTURE

Training programme on Azolla was

conducted for 04 farmers, on 23rd of
this month and Smt. Premlatha was the
resource person,

World Siddha Day

Celebrations

Happenings this
month:
Renewable Energy

Training programme on Organic waste

based Bio-methanation plant was conducted
at TRC, Kalluvilai on 23rd of this month for 4
persons.
Er.V.Ramakrishnan
was
the
resource person.
Construction of Bio-Methanation plants:
Bio-methanation
plants
have
been
constructed
at
Kancheepuram
and
Rameshwaram

Portable type 1 cum - 2

Fixed type 1 cum 10

Fixed type 1 cum - 3

Siddha
Vaidyars
Federation,
Virudhunagar
conducted a seminar on
10th of this month at Cherukkur,
Srivilliputhur to commemorate world
Siddha day. 300 physicians attended the
function. Dr.V.Ganapathi gave a lecture
on Varma Yogam

Construction work of fixed type

Bio-methation plant at Kalpakkam

Happenings this month: on

Siddha-Ethnic Medicine

Workshop on Traditional Siddha Varma

Bone Setting Practices Was conducted
on 26th and 27th of this month at TRC,
Kalluvilai for 55 traditional physicians.
Dr.Ganapathi and his team were the
resource persons.

Green Rameshwaram

Training programme on Kitchen waste

based Bio-methanation plant was conducted
with support from BrahMos, New Delhi on
4th with 15 persons benefitting from the
training and the resource person was
Shri.V.Ramakrishnan.
Dr.Ganapathy lecturing at World
Siddha conference

Happenings this
month:
Water Management

Demonstration at the Varma Bone

setting workshop:

Bio-methanation technology awareness

programmes for housewives have been
conducted at Rameshwaram.

To know more about Green Rameshwaram Pilgrimage Project contact:

Secretary, Vivekananda Kendra - Nardep, Vivekanandapuram, Kanyakumari-629702;
Phone:04652-246296, 9442646296 Email: vknardep@gmail.com

Lotus started blooming in the

renovated Rina-vimochana Teertham

Green Health Home of VK-nardep

functioned for 5 days and treated
131 patients.

Echoes of Eco - Newsletter, Vivekananda Kendra nardep, May 2015, Vol. 7 No: 3

The mutual-aid tendency in man has so remote an origin, and is so deeply interwoven with all the
past evolution of the human race, that is has been maintained by mankind up to the present time,
notwithstanding all vicissitudes of history.
Peter Kropotkin

From our
Publications

Echoes of Eco - Newsletter, Vivekananda Kendra nardep, May 2015, Vol. 7 No: 3

If, in our haste to 'progress,' the economics of ecology are disregarded by citizens and policy
makers alike, the result will be an ugly America. We cannot afford an America where expedience
tramples upon esthetics and development decisions are made with an eye only on the present.
-Stewart Udall

Eco-Ethics
Individuals in a wide variety of species
ranging from elephants, dolphins and
whales to farmed animals like cows and
pigs and companion animals like dogs, cats,
and horses, may feel love for their
relatives and friends. We scientists in the
past often resorted to academic jargon.
Now many of us call it what it is: a deep
loving connection between two animals
such that when the two are forced apart
through death (or some other separation),
the survivor may feel profound grief,
visible to observers in new patterns of
social withdrawal and/or disrupted life
routines. The key question now is, what
do we do with this knowledge? We should
use it to better the lives of animals who
presently are kept captive in biomedical
laboratories, circuses and theme parks,
and factory farms. think of the factoryfarm cow who has her calves taken away
after a few weeks or months, over and
over again; about the orca taken from his
or her pod in the sea and brought to
captivity to perform for us; The
growing scientific knowledge of animal
emotion can be put to excellent use. We
can move increasingly towards a plantbased diet; refuse to support SeaWorld,
the circus, and other places that exploit
animals for our entertainment; and
agitate for an end to intolerable
biomedical research using animals.

Eco-Empathy
That the sheltered life is no better for
plants than for man is suggested by an
interesting experiment. A plant, which was
carefully protected under glass from
outside blows, looked most sleek and
flourishing, but its conducting power was
found atrophied or paralyzed. Yet, when a
succession of blows were rained on this
effete and bloated specimen, the stimulus
canalized its own path of conduction, and
the plant soon became more alert and
responsive, and its nervous impulses were
very much quickened. It is impossible for a
spectator of the Professors experiments
to make any attempt to separate himself
from the rest of life. In the matter of
automatic heartbeats the Indian plant,
Desmodium Gyrans, shows remarkable
activity, and Professor Bose, by obtaining
records of these pulsations, shows that
the throbbing in the plant are affected by
external agents in precisely the same way
as the heartbeats of an animal. Thus, in
plant, as in animal life, the pulse-frequency
is increased under the action of warmth
and lessened under cold. The ancient
thinkers knew well that life and mind exist
everywhere in essence and vary only by
the degree and manner of their emergence
and functioning. All is in all and it is out of
the complete involution that the complete
evolution progressively appears.

- Barbara King
Biological
anthropologist

-Sri Aurobindo
Mystic

Eco-Spirituality
We need to re-learn lessons from those
very societies and cultures of the human
species where this consciousness was
ingrained as a primary article of faith.
The
consciousness
and
awareness
articulated itself in a body of poetry, oral
and written, the evolution of a mythical
world which drew attention repeatedly to
the eco-system and interrelationships. A
series of festivals, customs, and rituals
served as a constant reminder. Naturally
the notion of sacred space and time was
essential for how else could earth, water,
vegetation, air, rejuvenate themselves
singly or together unless left fallow or
undisturbed for a time. Mangroves,
rivers, water-bodies, such as lakes and
tanks; tracts of land were accorded a
sacred status as a most effective
strategy and instrumentality of ensuring
non-pollution and purity to sustain ecobalances. The agricultural practices and
other lifestyle functions were designed
to accommodate the cycle of inactivity
and activity, the latency and potency, of
both the natural and the human world.
We also know that this world-view was
overtaken in some parts of the world by
another where Nature was considered
"Red in tooth and claw". In that era, all
that the Vedic seers evoked as the
waters, earth, mountains, rivers, trees,
animals, air and fire was considered pagan
or at best pantheistic.

Kapila Vatsyayan
Evolutionary
Ecologist

Vivekananda Kendra nardep, Kanyakumari-629702 Phone:91-4652-246296 www.vknardep.org