Reflections on Parisara-niti-shatakam (on Environmental Ethics) for Nepali Himalayan Environmental Dynamics and Well-Being

The Himalayan people of Nepal face challenges due to multiple risk factors. Raising temperatures, decreasing rainfall, frequent extreme weather events, climate-related disasters, and migration have threatened their survival and livelihoods. Every year, lives, livelihoods, properties, prosperity, and traditional tangible and intangible cultural heritages are lost. This seriously challenges individuals, households, communities, the country, and the global communities. This chapter is primarily based on the reflection of the book Parisara-niti-shatakam (PNS) (on Environmental Ethics) by Mangesh Venkatesh (Nadkarni, MangeshVenkatesh 2017. ParisaraNiti-Shatakam. Chinmaya International Foundation ShodhaSansthan, Ernakulam.) and links them to empirical studies and observations on Himalayan environmental dynamics. The book is written in poetry in Sanskrit and translated and explained into English. PNS deals with issues, causes, and ways to combat environmental degradation. Issues and problems discussed by Nadkarni are the reality of Himalayan people who have encountered them in everyday life. The book suggests transforming human aggressive attitude towards the mother earth and the five elements. Similarly, emphasis is given to the realization and need to internalize that human beings are part of natural environment. The author persuades the dominant class need to control their excessive greed, develop new environment-friendly technologies, and provide the highest priorities to spiritual values for planetary well-being. These are valuable learning for the young generation and policy-makers. Nadkarni has observed the problem in production, consumption, socio-economic, and political systems regarding the quality of the environment. To cope and adapt to the environmental crisis, the government of Nepal has formulated and applied national and local level adaptation and resilience policies. Their effective and sincere implementation is questioned because of lacking and environmental ethics. Spiritual worldview and environmental ethics could initiate meaningful changes to control greed and aggressiveness that could be realized in the natural environmental well-being, personal life, and livelihood of people. Following the argument of (Nadkarni, MangeshVenkatesh 2017. ParisaraNiti-Shatakam. Chinmaya International Foundation ShodhaSansthan, Ernakulam.), a collectively adapted global spiritual and environmental ethics that facilitate a positive attitude towards Mother Earth, humanity is fruitful in solving global environmental catastrophe and bringing happiness, healthy, and prosperous global citizens and their well-being.