Ecocriticism and Urban Decay: The Role of Spaces in Arundhati Roy’s The Ministry of Utmost Happiness

Abstract

Arundhati Roy’s The Ministry of Utmost Happiness (2017) intricately weaves urban and natural spaces—graveyards, old cities, and protest sites—into a narrative that reflects resilience, decay, and resistance in contemporary India. This paper employs Ecocriticism to argue that Roy presents these spaces as dynamic agents, countering urban decay while critiquing the environmental and social costs of postcolonial modernity. Drawing on Lawrence Buell’s ecocritical framework, Rob Nixon’s slow violence, and Jane Bennett’s vital materialism, I analyze how the graveyard becomes a sanctuary, Old Delhi a site of historical entropy, and protest sites a nexus of defiance. Set against India’s rapid urbanization and political upheaval, these spaces challenge anthropocentric narratives, embodying both ecological loss and human endurance. This study positions The Ministry as a vital ecocritical text, illuminating the symbiotic relationship between degraded landscapes and marginalized communities in South Asia’s urban sprawl.