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The Backwaters Below Sea Level
Kuttanad farms two metres under the water it sits beside. Here is how.
Kuttanad is one of very few places on earth where farming happens below sea level, and the only place in India. The paddy sits two metres under the surface of the Vembanad, held back by earth bunds.
The system dates to the nineteenth century and depends entirely on pumping. Walk a bund at harvest and the water is at your shoulder on one side and the crop at your ankle on the other.
The Thanneermukkom barrage, built in the seventies, keeps salt water out during the dry months. It also changed the lake's ecology permanently, which remains contested locally.
None of this is visible from a day boat. It becomes obvious from the smaller canals, which is the argument for the smaller boats.
