Chipko Movement Revisited: Women In Uttarakhand Hug Trees To Prevent Road Construction

Women in Uttarakhand’s Jakhani village in Bageshwar revived tales of the iconic Chipko Movement as they hugged tress to protect them from felling for the proposed construction of Kamedi Devi-Rangthara-Majgaon-Chaunala road. As per reports, the women claimed that the forest in question is dedicated to a goddess, and the trees are like children to the locals.

The area’s sarpanch, Kamala Mehta, told a portal, “Chaunala village has already a road and as such what is the use of another road and cutting trees for the construction? We won’t let them cut our trees since felling trees will not only destroy the environment but also the natural water resources of our area.”

Ishwar Joshi, a junior engineer of the public works department (PWD), told the portal, “Our department is constructing a road on the instruction of the district magistrate. Villagers of one village are opposing the felling of trees. We have informed our senior officials about the protest.”

The construction of Kamedi Devi-Rangthara-Majgaon-Chaunala road was sanctioned in 2009, but owing to protests by villagers of Seri and Jakhani, the work couldn’t continue. In the months that followed, villages from Majgaon, a village next to Jakhani, approached the High Court for the road’s construction and it asked the authorities to go ahead. Mid-March, the villagers of Seri protested and halted the construction, however, the local administration continued to work with local police.

Meanwhile, the first Chipko movement can be traced to 1730, when Amrita Devi mobilised villagers to prevent the trees from being felled in Khejarli village, on the instructions of the Maharaja of Jodhpur. Reports suggest that around 363 members of the Bishnoi tribe were beheaded as they hugged the trees to prevent felling. This news forced the Maharaja to pass a decree disallowing cutting of trees in the area.

*All pictures are screenshots from a video posted by Chinar India on Instagram.