(via Vimla Bahuguna: Treehugger of the Chipko Movement | EcoWalktheTalk)
By Bhavani Prakash
Chipko women hugging trees : Wikipedia
Much has been said and written about the Chipko Movement. It continues to be one of the most prominent and analysed of environmental movements emanating from India. Long before ‘treehugging’ became a fashionable word in the west, women villagers of the Garhwal region on the foothills of the Himalayas (Uttarakhand District in Northern India) were practising it by becoming brave champions of the forests. To resist commercial felling of trees, they hugged them, giving rise to the term ‘Chipko’ which means ‘to stick‘ in Hindi.
The modern day Chipko movement is now nearly 40 years old. On March 26, 1974, a group of peasant women in Reni village, Hemwalghati, Uttarakhand, India, prevented the cutting of trees by contractors of the state Forest Department.
Vimla Bahuguna
Vimla Bahugana, a Gandhian social worker became one of the prominent women leaders of the movement. Women bore most of the consequences of tree felling. They had to travel long distances to collect firewood. Water sources were drying up, and the soil was getting eroded as their trees were cut for cricket bats and other commercial products. Women were at the forefront of the movement.
