India’s Sacred Groves Are Resurrecting a Vanishing

Ancolie Stoll tends one such space, Nilatangam. This is a 7.5-hectare afforestation and restoration project that her European parents started when Auroville was founded.

Nilatangam boasts tall trees from many parts of the globe but has few indigenous varieties. It isn’t dense and complex like the forests of the sacred groves. The trees are arranged in a grid like crops on farmland. There are walking paths and…