India, March 21 -- The popular perception of Punjab is of a land of endless fields located on flat plains formed by the rivers that give it its name. But this was not always the case.

The province, today divided into the independent countries of India and Pakistan, was once home to forests and woodland. These areas sheltered outlaws and were inspiration for Sufis, Sikh Gurus and poets.

As the cover of author David Gilmartin's 2020 book Blood and Water: The Indus river basin in modern history notes, "The Indus basin was once an arid pastoral watershed, but by the second half of the twentieth century, it had become one of the world's most heavily irrigated and populated river basins."

This was especially true for the tracts of land betwe...