What Kerala’s 1/3rd Principle Can Teach All of Us
Travelling into Kerala is a most idyllic experience. This verdant paradise, with its azure coastlines, flowing rivers, and verdant mountains, offers a stunning tapestry of tropical life. And, with good reason. Since antiquity, it was known as the Malabar — where the Mala (Mountains, in Malayalam) met with the Bar (Sea, in Arabic). A land axed by tectonic change to be gifted with unique representative features — sea, lakes plains, monuments, rivers, streams, backwaters, forest, and vast green fields.
The serene backwaters merge effortlessly with lush green banks across 44 rivers, cradling its 93 cities, 150 towns, and 1,553 villages which are home to Kerala’s 33 million people. Kerala is a mosaic of nature’s finest elements — sea, lakes, rivers, forests, and vast green fields, each one an essential part of its ecosystem.
And yet, that mosaic is now shattered.
Since 2018, Kerala has been devastated by a series of annual floods and landslides that have taken innocent lives, decimating unsuspecting communities and destroyed local ecosystems. The latest being the Wayanad landslide occurred in the Mundakkai and Chooralamala regions of Wayanad on July 30, 2024. It was one of the devastating landslides triggered by heavy monsoon rains in Kerala that year, impacting the Puthumala area in the district.
The Wayanad landslide caused significant destruction, including the loss of 500 lives, homes, and infrastructure, and highlighting the vulnerability of Kerala to such natural disasters. The cause: mining, quarrying, and the rapacious plunder of the Western Ghats forests, exacerberated by the fallout effects of climate change on India’s oldest mountain range.
Fury of nature on the night of 8th August 2024, was captured by filmmaker and photojournalist Shaju John, as he chronicled the horrifying impact of the Wayanad landslide for his upcoming film series: Wounded Hills. In the photo above, you see the journey of single boulder weighing hundreds of tonnes from its source 6 kilometres away in the Western Ghats range of Wayanad.
The rogue fury of the landslide deposited the said boulder on another hill top in Mundakkai village. A tragic memorial for the 500 people who lost their lives in this horrifying tragedy. What makes this photo all the more poignant, Shaju John observed, is that the origin of the landslide — the ground zero of destruction — is visible in the distance between the mountains.
A hundred years earlier, in a different India with more stable ecosystems and less plunder, the same region saw a similar story, but with a vastly different outcome.
But Kerala was not always like this.
For centuries, Kerala held the One-third principle sacred in its statecraft when it came to allocating resources for the building of its villages, towns and cities. And what is Kerala’s One-Third Principle? In principle, it states: When you plan your home, settlement, city or country, allot one-third for the forest or green cover, one-third for water and one-third for your people.
Kerala’s One-Third Principle was drawn from the ancient Travancore kingdom’s statecraft principles is the allocation of resources to a place once you decide to built a village, town or city on it. When you build, allot one-third of the land for water, one-third of the land for the forest, and one-third of the land for the people. You can apply to a city, a town, a village and importantly, your home.
For centuries in Kerala (as in the rest of India), you respected the waterline in summer. And You respect the waterline during the monsoons. And, you did not build in between. Ancient wisdom held by the ‘maistries ‘ — India’s master workmen (masons) who ensured this balance. Since onset of the Industrial Revolution in 1850, this principle has been violated many times over as urbanization and industrialization took precedence over the development agenda. And the costs of floods that cripple cities today the world over.
Kerala’s One-Third Principle ensured that its communities had free and equitable access to water, food and living needs. With this in place, everything else in Kerala became possible. Education, Empowerment, Literacy, and even, the surge in Economic Power the state is experiencing today through industry, information technology and tourism. The respect for the balance between water needs and forest needs and people needs. But does the principle really work in the 21st Century? Well, you can find out here at the UST campus in Trivandrum that has implemented Kerala’s 1/3rd Principle:
Kerala’s One-Third Principle is an admirable principle for our 21st Century world. It was the first disaster management plan too. Allowing water to take its course and storing water for communities who clustered around coastal and rice growing areas. It created the environment and the conditions for one of the most liveable communities in the world with a high social index.
These floods also saw they rising of Kerala’s new generation. It revealed the indomitable spirit of young people who will inherit our earth: its azure coastlines, flowing rivers and verdant mountains. Kerala’s One-Third Principle will create a safe and sustainable world for them. It can applied everywhere to our planning of cities, towns, Industry & IT parks and our homes — starting now. That is why flying into Kerala even today is an experience in itself, as you can see here from the picture of the ‘India-shaped’ Vellayani lake at Trivandrum.
To preserve this delicate balance, it is imperative that Kerala dedicates one-third of its land to forests, one-third to water, and one-third to its people. Only by doing so can we ensure that this enchanting land continues to thrive, offering its beauty and bounty to future generations.
Kerala’s 1/3rd Principle is a quest for our time of climate change. How will we heed the wisdom of our ancestors — our forefathers and our foremothers. It refers to the snow lines (and retreating glaciers) of the North Pole. It refers to the lava lines in the islands of Hawaii. It refers to the Great Barrier Reef of Australia. It refers to the forests that line the banks of the Amazon that flow through the countries of Peru, Bolivia, Venezuela, Colombia,Ecuador, and Brazil.
Across all of these cultures, it is time for us remember the wisdom of our ancestors who respected the elements and revered their connection to nature.
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