Going with the flow? Urban wastewater and livelihoods change in peri-urban Bengaluru

As cities grow, peri-urban areas and surrounding villages undergo rapid changes in land use, environment and livelihoods. The conventional view on change in peri-urban areas is one of shifts in livelihoods away from agriculture towards urban jobs, as well as keeping lands fallow, to be taken up by real estate or industries. Further, people in peri-urban areas experience huge changes in the nature of and control over local natural resources. This is particularly so in the case of water resources. The demand for water from expanding cities is often met by sourcing it from peri-urban areas. In addition, domestic sewage and industrial discharges from cities put pressure on lakes and rivers, and the impact of pollution is felt in surrounding landscapes. Planners and policymakers have been grappling with the implications of such transformations for both agricultural production and environmental sustainability. Here we examine the case of peri-urban Bengaluru to ask the questions: is abandoning agriculture inevitable in the wake of urbanisation or can there be other trajectories? How have peri-urban farmers been responding to water pollution and changes in irrigation water quality