Chapter 5 - Sustainable Development and the role of IPR in Protecting Indigenous Knowledge: Empirical Insights from the Biligiriranga Hills and Emerging AI Challenges

In the present times, Western Science and Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK) hold the prospect to merge considerately and cooperatively, proposing an integrated footpath toward sustainability and the strength of both natural worlds and humanity. Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK) which is commonly known as Indigenous Local Knowledge is the set of practices that had been passed down from one generation to another by means of cultural memory, susceptivity to change and values that is inclusive of cooperation. TEK today offers cherishing conservation practices that can go a long way in achieving sustainable development as the observations regarding those practices are mostly qualitative and long-term. The advent of Artificial Intelligence (AI) has definitely imposed further challenges in the backdrop of the current Intellectual property model offering only limited protection to the knowledge held by the indigenous communities. Living in a biodiversity rich nation, safeguarding and promoting indigenous knowledge holds a stupendous value in achieving sustainable development. In the first part of the paper, the author attempts to scrutinize the role of traditional knowledge in achieving sustainable development. The author also throws a light on the legal frameworks at national and international level with regard to safeguarding indigenous knowledge. This paper examines the tangled relationship between IPR and preservation of indigenous knowledge held by the indigenous communities by drawing empirical insights from the Soliga Tribes of Biligiriranga Hills of Karnataka. The proposed study explores the perceptions of Traditional Knolwegde holders regarding the misappropriation and ownership at the backdrop of the medicinal and ecological practices that the community strongly holds. The study aims to contribute to the emerging discourse on indigenous intellectual property, sustainability and emerging AI threats by combining the legal analysis with the empirical insights.