Under the peepal

Arjun Swaminathan

Storytellers would travel from village to village, narrating stories on lives, livelihoods, cultures, values, knowledge systems, codes of conduct, divisions of labour, food systems, sociopolitics, and their relationships to their natural habitats. Somewhere along the way, this old practice started dying out, leaving precious local knowledge in the past. We bring stories from local and indigenous communities about the rich rural life. 

  1. 11 HR AGO

    From the Field to the Kitchen

    Rahul and Sampada run Farm of Happiness, a homestay about forty kilometres from Ratnagiri. Both left city careers to build this place. Arjun sat down with them to talk about food, culture, what children will and won't eat, how cropping patterns have shifted, and what climate change looks like as it moves from their fields into their kitchens. The conversation moves the way cooking does. Slow, unhurried thoughts spoken as they arrive. Listen in, see what it brings up for you. Hands of Transition started in 2025 with a straightforward idea. The people living through food insecurity and climate stress are also the ones best placed to fix it. It brings together communities across India who are already doing that work, connecting design, storytelling, and on-the-ground action in ways that feel organic rather than imposed. There's no top-down blueprint here. The initiative is built around making room for these communities to tell their stories and drive change from within.

    1h 27m

  2. 11 HR AGO

    Food, Families, and Leaving Home

    Jayanth Phadke is a writer closely connected to the culture of the Konkan region. Arjun met him at a small restaurant over tea, and they spoke about food, families, and migration. The kind of conversation that unfolds slowly and stays with you. Hands of Transition started in 2025 with a straightforward idea. The people living through food insecurity and climate stress are also the ones best placed to fix it. It brings together communities across India who are already doing that work, connecting design, storytelling, and on-the-ground action in ways that feel organic rather than imposed. There's no top-down blueprint here. The initiative is built around making room for these communities to tell their stories and drive change from within.

    29 min

  3. 11 HR AGO

    What It Costs to Grow and Fish

    When it comes to mangoes and fish, we often speak of them as delicacies. But the commercial side matters just as much. It shapes how we farm and how we fish, and in turn, what finally reaches our plates. This episode brings together two perspectives on the economics of food. One from land, one from sea. Hands of Transition started in 2025 with a straightforward idea. The people living through food insecurity and climate stress are also the ones best placed to fix it. It brings together communities across India who are already doing that work, connecting design, storytelling, and on-the-ground action in ways that feel organic rather than imposed. There's no top-down blueprint here. The initiative is built around making room for these communities to tell their stories and drive change from within.

    22 min

  4. 11 HR AGO

    Alphonso and the Farmer

    When we talk about mangoes, we usually stay with the fruit. Its sweetness, its season, its reputation. But behind that are decisions shaped by weather, markets, and memory. Omkar Ranade is a third-generation mango farmer in Ratnagiri, and he has been living with those decisions for a long time. Arjun sat with him at his orchard to talk about the history of the Alphonso name, why most of his produce travels straight to city consumers, and how subtle shifts in climate are changing not just yields but taste itself. What does it mean to keep farming when the old rhythms no longer hold the same shape? Hands of Transition started in 2025 with a straightforward idea: the people living through food insecurity and climate stress are also the ones best placed to fix it. It brings together communities across India who are already doing that work, connecting design, storytelling, and on-the-ground action in ways that feel organic rather than imposed. There's no top-down blueprint here. The initiative is built around making room for these communities to tell their stories and drive change from within.

    39 min

  5. 3 DAYS AGO

    Taste of Change - The People Who Carved the Coast

    Meeting Sudhir Risbud happened by chance. While researching food around Ratnagiri, Arjun stumbled upon geoglyphs in the district and ended up sitting down with Sudhir to talk about early modern humans and what these ancient carvings tell us. It connects to the larger thread running through this series: people adapting to landscape, to climate, to what the land offers. Just stretched across thousands of years instead of decades. The Konkan was once a rainforest. Now it is grassland. This land has always been in conversation with the people who lived on it. Hands of Transition started in 2025 with a straightforward idea — the people living through food insecurity and climate stress are also the ones best placed to fix it. It brings together communities across India who are already doing that work, connecting design, storytelling, and on-the-ground action in ways that feel organic rather than imposed. There's no top-down blueprint here. The initiative is built around making room for these communities to tell their stories and drive change from within.

    34 min

  6. 3 DAYS AGO

    The Taste of Change - Introduction

    How much does climate change alter the taste of the food you love? Arjun Swaminathan travels to the Konkan coast to find out. Through conversations with fisherfolk, farmers, and home cooks, this series traces something quieter than floods and failed crops, the slow, almost invisible shift in the flavors and food traditions of a place. Because climate change doesn't just affect what we grow. It changes what we remember. Hands of Transition started in 2025 with a straightforward idea — the people living through food insecurity and climate stress are also the ones best placed to fix it. It brings together communities across India who are already doing that work, connecting design, storytelling, and on-the-ground action in ways that feel organic rather than imposed. There's no top-down blueprint here. The initiative is built around making room for these communities to tell their stories and drive change from within.

    2 min

  7. 21/11/2025

    Living Constitution

    This multimedia story was developed by Native Picture, with support from Kalpavriksh, Vikalp Sangam and the Paul Hamlyn Foundation. In this episode we travel to Pachgaon, a small village in Maharashtra, India, to listen to a quiet but powerful story of self governance. The people of Pachgaon speak about how their lives began to change when they came together to understand and claim their rights over land and forests. What follows is not just a legal process but a deeply human journey shaped by trust, collective decision making, and a long relationship with the forest. As seasonal migration, uncertainty and exclusion once defined everyday life, asserting rights under the Forest Rights Act helped the community imagine a different future. Through village meetings, shared responsibility and local knowledge, Pachgaon began to practice democracy in its most grounded form. This episode reflects on how laws become meaningful only when people make them their own, turning a written constitution into something lived and practiced every day.

    46 min
  8. Anup Ranjan Pandey - Echoes from Bastar, the tribal heartland

    05/09/2024

    Anup Ranjan Pandey - Echoes from Bastar, the tribal heartland

    Anup Ranjan Pandey speaks unhurriedly and deliberately about his work. He hesitates to describe himself as an artist, preferring to highlight his enthusiasm and love for the arts instead. It is true that the term ‘artist’ does not fit him, but not because of some hierarchical measure of ‘quality’. It is because the scope of his work extends to cultural preservation, community engagement, and much more.

    9 min
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About

Storytellers would travel from village to village, narrating stories on lives, livelihoods, cultures, values, knowledge systems, codes of conduct, divisions of labour, food systems, sociopolitics, and their relationships to their natural habitats. Somewhere along the way, this old practice started dying out, leaving precious local knowledge in the past. We bring stories from local and indigenous communities about the rich rural life. 

Information

  • Creator
    Arjun Swaminathan
  • Years Active
    2021 - 2026
  • Episodes
    21
  • Rating
    Clean
  • Copyright
    © Arjun Swaminathan
  • Show Website
    Under the peepal