Agrarian life and Sacred Ecology: Exploring Religion, Ritual, and Farming in Bundelkhand region of Madhya Pradesh

This paper explores the intersection of agricultural lifestyle, ritual practices, and ecological traditions in Bundelkhand region of Madhya Pradesh. The study reveals the parallel existence of agricultural resilience through practices rooted in the local traditions of worshipping local deities, seasonal ceremonies, and sacred groves. The study also looks into the Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK) and its support for sustainable agriculture. Bundelkhand’s agrarian distress is largely an outcome of loss of sustainable agricultural practices, soil degradation, and shortfall of rain. These factors have increased the relevance of community-based responses. The paper is an ethnographic study based on field work across six villages distributed evenly in three districts of Bundelkhand region. The paper employs qualitative methods to get an in-depth understanding of the local narratives related to spirituality and its connection with the agrarian lifestyle. The findings reveal that traditional ecological knowledge and the spiritual connotations of rural life contribute substantially in sustaining the agrarian economy. The paper contributes to a broader theme of agro ecology, a de-colonised understanding of Indian rural society by critically analysing the interface between material agrarian concerns and the cosmological aspect of religious life in the global south.