Paper short abstract:

This paper analyses the local resistances towards green energy transition in Thar and examines them with a political ecology lens. It reveals that multiple layers of power, class and creation of alliances horizontally and vertically determines the negotiations and outcomes.

Paper long abstract:

Drylands have been understood by the state as empty homogeneous spaces, waiting to be “civilized”, and home to “unproductive” livelihoods like pastoralism. Such understandings have put these landscapes at the helm of state efforts aimed at controlling these landscapes and transitions that marginalize them and their inhabitants.

India aims to produce 50 percent of its energy from non-fossil fuel sources by 2030. This transition is shifting the energy map of the country from eastern coal belts to the drylands in the western part, i.e. the Thar desert. The landscape was situated as unruly, under the colonial state in India. This along with narratives of desertification, climate change and conservation have put the landscape as a point of amalgamation of multiple simplifications and discourses, which is visible in the efforts of transition that have come up in the landscape. These interventions range from canals, defense projects, sanctuaries, and the contemporary green energy transition.

These interventions have had widespread impacts on the commons in the landscape and the livelihoods dependent on them. In response to the perceived long-term impacts of these interventions, there have been local responses. This paper explores these responses and examines them with a political ecology lens. Contrary to the discourses of 'empty', the local resistances are informed by narratives of conservation and saving local culture. These resistances not only inform about the local agency but further elaborate over the history of the region as a sacrificial zone for developmental goals along with multiple positionalities within the local communities.