Continuing the discussion from Introducing Climate Week India:
One city in 2019. Thirty-one places in 2025. Sixty-nine places in 2026. And those are only the ones we know about.
In 2019, Climate Week was held in a single city. We set out to do the same again. After two months of conversations, we could see that one city was not enough. Climate Week in India would run in several cities at the same time.
By September 2025, the first edition had grown to 31 habitations (villages, towns and cities).
This year, the 2026 map shows more than 201 events in 69 habitations (that we know of). Please note: The 224 figure reflects events in the week before and after Climate Week India, which served as either the setup for or the wrap-up of events between September 27th and October 4th, 2026.
Three small, but important, words: “that we know of”
This year’s numbers need a footnote. Beyond the 194~ organisations that are on the Commons Agreement, I have seen organisations and people we (the 5 Ambassadors and the Anchor) have never spoken to make videos, run events, hold marches and put up banners. All of them said “Climate Week India 2026”.
None of them are on our WhatsApp community or our mailing lists. None of them have signed the Commons Agreement. That agreement is trust-based and not legally binding, and the whole coalition is built on it. Who knows, perhaps it may raise challenges in the future, but it has worked up till now. That said, the Agreement’s intention is to ensure all partners are personally onboarded and willing to put their name to its commitments.
So when we say 201 events, we mean 201 that we know of.
Climate Week India is built on inclusion. Anyone should be able to attend a Climate Week, or build their own event, wherever they live and in whichever language they work. This year, the festival ran in 23 states (that we know of). Its website was translated, by people, into eight languages.
Here is the About Us page in Konkani. A student, guided by her professor, from Carmel College of Arts, Science and Commerce for Women, Nuvem, Salcete, Goa, drafted it.
From comedy to kathak, from river walks to a post-festival clean-up, from a forest to the India International Centre, here is a sample of what happened:
- Cell Savvy’s 1.5 Degrees Comedy Night, GA
- Climate Cadets Collective’s Youth Parliament, NCR
- Bhoomi Bhaasha Climate Mural, KL
- Femfuture Collective & Koru Foundation’s Climate & Gender: From Stories to Action, JH
- Climate Undone, Insights from the Vadodara & Ahmedabad Ecosystems, GJ
- Shantashree Academy’s विद्यार्थ्यांशी संवाद, MH
- Nadhi: She for Climate’s Unscripted, Game On, Career Exchange, MH, NCR, GJ, TL, KA, TN
- Bengaluru Creative Circus, Climate Carnival, KA
- The Curiosity Quotient’s Earth Quiz, TN
- Biopod, Exhibit After Dark, GA
- Forest Post’s KannadaPaayi, KL
- Chennai Climate Action Group, TN
- Talk Dharti to Me, KA, MH, WB, DL, TL
- Rooted Cities’ Kathak & Climate, DL
- All Kerala Rivers Alliance’s Rivers of India, KL
- Indian Ploggers Army, Post Ganesh Chaturthi Clean-up, KA
- Iruthi Collective’s In Between Shiruvaani and Kathaalakkandi Sound Installation, KL
- NCR CW-I Chapter, Climate Assembly, NCR
- Vriksh & Goa University, PoeTree Walk, GA
- Naambu’s എങ്ങോട്ടാ, KL
Come back to get acquainted with charming moments like where an organisation asked for Rs 6,000 to run their event, spent Rs 4,500 and offered the rest to another organisation to run theirs. Or another moment where Rs 10,000 young leaders ran 8 events with over 2,000 attendees.
Finally, somewhere out there are people who ran Climate Week India 2026 and never told any of us, the organisers of organisers. We are still finding them. In future posts, we will look at the agreement that lets strangers join a festival without asking anyone’s permission—they just need to agree to, or openly challenge, the Community’s Agreements.