How Does ‘A Night Never to Be Lost’ Allude to Environmental Issue?

The story ‘A Night Never to be Lost’ is a part of Sarah Joseph’s “Gift in Green”, a book of stories and story tellers. It is set against the background of Aathi, a fictitious place like R. K. Narayan’s Malgudi. The theme of the story is centred round the deep and passionate love of a young man named Noor Muhammed for a rustic girl who considers it her mission to sweep away the fetid assortment of decaying garbage from the soil of Aathi and the nearby water paths and dump it into a pit she had dug on the surface of an uninhabited island in the far eastern corner of Aathi. The girl was deeply engrossed in locating and removing the garbage. The callous visitors had spoiled the nature by leaving behind assortment of decaying garbage. It consisted of cigarette packets, liquor and cola bottles, left-over food, polythene bags rotten fruits etc. Fascinated by the girl’s self-less action, Noor extended his helping hand to her in her venture. Together they worked picking up garbage and casting it into the pit on the lonely island. She quenched his thirst by offering him a green-bamboo-mugful of pristine from a water trough which the girl herself had set by letting water drop drip by drip from a long green bamboo stem into a pit she had dug. Obviously, the story alludes to environmental issues and the socio-political aspects of human right of water.