Digitized Dystopias: Climate Refugees, AI Governance, and Techno-Feudalism in Anil Menon’s The Inconceivable Idea of the Sun

This paper explores the ecocritical dimensions of Anil Menon’s speculative fiction, examining how environmental degradation is inextricably linked to structures of caste, technological governance, and neoliberal control. Set against the backdrop of climate collapse and technological ascendancy, Menon’s narratives offer a provocative lens into futures where ecological scarcity and algorithmic regulation converge to entrench social hierarchies. The paper argues that Menon’s fiction functions as a speculative ecology of injustice, where clean air, potable water, and habitable land are transformed from commons into commodities, rationed according to caste and capital. Drawing on frameworks such as Rob Nixon’s ‘slow violence’ and critique of humanitarian techno politics, this study investigates how environmental precarity becomes a tool for governance. Artificial intelligence and digital surveillance, far from being neutral innovations, are shown to inherit and intensify casteist and capitalist logics, turning climate resilience into a privilege rather than a right. Through this lens, Menon’s work critiques the rise of corporate climate governance and the emergence of eco-apartheid – a system where ecological survival is no longer a shared human imperative but a curated, exclusionary experience. The paper positions Menon’s speculative futures as urgent critiques of our present moment, urging a reconceptualization of ecocriticism beyond landscapes and aesthetics. Instead, it advocates for a politicized ecocritical praxis – one attuned to power, data, and dispossession. In doing so, the paper contributes to ongoing debates on environmental justice, climate inequality, and the socio-technical imaginaries shaping the Anthropocene. Keywords: Speculative fiction, Digital Casteism, AI and Surveillance, Eco-Apartheid, Corporate Climate Governance