Abstract
This paper undertakes an ecocritical reading of Kālidāsa’s classical Sanskrit drama Abhijñānaśākuntalam (The Recognition of Śakuntalā) in order to recover the ecological consciousness that animates its poetic world. Working within the interpretive tradition established by Western ecocriticism and extended by scholars of Indian environmental thought, the study argues that nature in the play is not decorative background but an active moral and affective presence that shapes character, plot, and value. Through a qualitative, close-reading methodology, the analysis examines the hermitage of the sage Kaṇva as a biotic community, Śakuntalā’s kinship with plants and animals as an ecofeminist ethic of care, King Duṣyanta’s hunt as a meditation on restraint and the limits of dominion, the curse of forgetting as a figure for ecological alienation, and the reunion of the lovers as the restoration of a disturbed cosmic harmony. The paper concludes that Kālidāsa’s vision anticipates several concerns central to the contemporary environmental humanities—interdependence, biocentric regard, and the moral standing of the more-than-human world—and that Abhijñānaśākuntalam therefore offers a valuable indigenous resource for green literary studies in India.