With a slew of administrative changes, the ruling dispensation has threatened livelihoods, land ownership, culture, and the fragile ecology of the Lakshadweep islands, completely disenfranchising the local people of the land. This is yet another move to introduce demographic changes in the name of development, flout ecological concerns, and usurp the land while banishing its people. Despite the attempt to trample democratic protest from the people whose lives stand affected by the proposed changes, Lakshadweep has spoken up and sung about its unique ethnic and ecological heritage that needs to be preserved from heedless policy measures.
This episode of Waqt ki Awaaz brings together music from the islands — documenting for the first time Lakshadweep’s rich and diverse musical cultures, featuring abundant maritime metaphors evidencing its people’s intimate relationship with the ecology, and the unfazed rejection that has surfaced in the wake of recent policy threats from the regime.
