A slide down the mountains

Title: Up the Mountains of India 

(A fun, fact-filled trek across the country’s major ranges)

Author: Mala Kumar

Pages: 230

First published: 2023

Publisher: Hachette India

ISBN: 978-93-91028-98-5

Price: 499/-

Thanks to Teacher Plus, the review up on their site here.

What does this book talk about?

This book talks about the mountain ranges across the length and breadth of India – from Karakoram to the Eastern Ghats and from the Aravalli to the Naga Hills. It takes the readers along these ranges and provides information on the types of mountains, their history, and the species that inhabit the mountains. It also clarifies terms and concepts pertaining to mountains. Black and white maps, illustrations, and images in different sizes are present in generous numbers across the book. Towards the end, it also contains “mountain notes” on the mountain railways in India, mountain music, how we can conserve our mountains, etc.

What I enjoyed while reading this book?

The book clarifies commonly used words related to mountains. This is very helpful, given that many a time, we end up using words without adequately understanding them. It tells how the “fault-blocked mountains” are different from the “fold mountains”, or that the coniferous forests have “tall cone-bearing trees like pine”. It also brings out facts that we may have overlooked – that Nanda Devi at 7,817 m, for example, is fully in India, while Kanchenjunga at 8,598 m lies in both India and Nepal.

Similarly, the maps depicting the locations of the mountain ranges across the country and the timeline specifying their ages are useful too. The text is light and is peppered with generous doses of humour. The parallels drawn in the book too are of the kind that can resonate well with the young – those of recent movies, for example.

What in the book did not work for me?

This book has a very utilitarian take on the mountains. In the initial pages itself mountains are to “supply freshwater”, “provide food”, or “blocking mountain winds”. Should one not love the mountains just because they are there?

The tone is distant, western, urban, and elitist. It glorifies what researchers, scientists, geologists, climbers, trekkers, and academics have done or can do. The book talks about mountains without mentioning the people of the mountains, their food, their stories, their songs, their wisdom, their clothes, their way of life, and all else. There are fleeting glimpses, but overall, the people are conspicuous by their absence.

The book focuses on wildlife. However, there are points where research could have been better – neither are the hoolock gibbons found only in Mizoram nor have the lions been reintroduced in Kumbhalgarh. There are repeated mentions of wildlife living in national parks, but there is no talk about the animals living there using the larger mountainous landscapes, of which protected areas are a small part. And, for some reason Loktak lake in Manipur is discussed as being part of Meghalaya.

The book looks at the world in black and white. The nuances are kept at bay, as over-simplification creeps in. This line for example, “Should governments cater to people’s needs, or should governments leave the mountains untouched?” At multiple places, the book points out that threats (to the mountains) are from people but does not venture further – whether these are from policymakers, industrialists, locals, tourists, or others.

The book spreads itself thin. I wonder what the point was in talking about our independence movement or showing the images of defense personnel practicing yoga on the mountains. This brings me to the images and illustrations. They do not work either, especially the small-sized ones.

The book appears like a collage of information on mountains. A well-intentioned effort that tries a bit too much and ends up achieving little. There are books that take the reader to the mountains and make them fall in love with mountains. This book is not one of them.