Each of the campus stories of this week’s ‘Simply Smart’ rings a powerful truth: the journey to Net Zero does not begin with technology alone—it begins with wisdom. Long before the language of carbon footprints entered our 20th century-lexicon, Indian Knowledge Systems (IKS) offered deeply practical guidance on living in balance with nature. Today, students across campuses are rediscovering that this wisdom is not historical—it is operational in 21st century.

From cooling with mother Earth’s resource, to water stewardship rooted in traditional harvesting systems, to deployment of solar energy , IKS provides students with context-sensitive, low-cost, and heritage grounded solutions. These are not symbolic gestures. They are measurable interventions that reduce energy demand, conserve resources, and reshape everyday behaviour.

I am convinced that sustainability not as an obligation imposed from outside, but as an internal ethical practice emerging from within. Students are not just deploying solutions; they are becoming custodians.

In reconnecting with IKS, university students are not going backwards—they are accelerating forward, grounded in knowledge that has always known how to live within planetary limits. Indeed campuses are becoming places where ancient wisdom meets youthful innovation, to turn them into living laboratories of climate action.

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