Siyana, Rajasthan. February 2021.

The districts of West UP and Haryana surrounding Delhi are the most densely populated and heavily cultivated places on earth. Our runaway population is increasingly settled in a never-ending series of small and big mechanised towns merging into each other and into the megapolis of Delhi. The vastness of the desert is therefore exhilarating after the suffocating weight of human civilisation of these Ganga-Jamuna plains. Travelling in rural Bikaner was liberating, especially in these times, the 360 degrees expanse of horizon enabling one breathe with relief and surprise. The urban eyes initially cannot believe this landscape stripped of people, buildings, roads, vehicles and machines.  There are far fewer humans in the towns and villages, the desert radiates a meditative silence, villages lanes seem deserted and the dhanis (thatched huts of peasants located in agricultural fields, away from the settled village) at a healthy distance from each other establish a sense of quiet, self-sufficient isolation. Camels in the dunes and fields add a phlegmatic element to an already majestic ecology.