INTERNAL ASSESMENT

E.V.S
The word Chipko means that to stick or “to hug.” The Chipko movement name comes
from the word meaning “Embrace.” It is the significant meaning, which describes how
many villages people love and hug to the trees.
The trees were one of the most pressing needs of the Uttarakhand people and to save
the trees from destruction, they began the Chipko movement, and it became very
famous in Uttarakhand. Chipko movement is a grassroots level of action.
 A large number of trees were getting destroyed by the massive depletion of
forests, which results in deforestation.
 Significant damage was that it was making the Himalayan mountain range
barren.
 Another cause of the destruction of the trees is the construction of dams,
factories, and roads.
The Chipko movement was initiated by the Sundarlal Bahuguna with a group of
volunteers and women to make the non-violent protest by clinging to the trees to save
them from falling. Sundarlal Bahuguna belonged to the renowned Avandia. There is
much importance of the Chipko movement from the start itself; it became a great
movement for the Uttarakhand village’s people.
The first objective of the Chipko movement was to ensure an ecological balance and the
survivor the tribal people. Who is depending on the trees because their economic
activities relived around these forests?
To start the Chipko embrace drowsing neg. With Devi and many village women, first
saved trees by hugging them.
The most beautiful Chipko poet was composed by the Ghanshyam run which is what do
the forests bear soil, water, and pure air”.
 As a result of the Uttarakhand region, which is known as French miner ads soils
and forests, attracted many entrepreneurs. Soon the area becomes the object
of exploitation by their entrepreneurs.
 Some products for which the region exploitation was timber, limestone,
magnesium, potassium, etc. the primary source of conflicts in this region was
the exploitation of the forest by the entrepreneurs with the approval of the
government.
 The other reason for such conflicts was that the villages earlier denied the use of
forests.
 The streamlined policies did not allow the local agriculturists and herders to cut
the trees for fuelwood or fodder and certain another purpose.
 Instead, they told that dead trees and fallen branches solid serve their needs.
The agriculturists or herders could cut trees only for the construction of houses
and for making implants.
 The policies were reframed, claiming that the overuse of the forests was causing
deforestation.
 In 1973, the first Chipko movement took place in a village called Mandal. The
villagers had needed access to a small number of trees but were denied the same.
 It angered them when the same government sanctioned the cutting of trees on a
much larger area.
 Led by Chandi Prasad Bhatt, the villagers hugged the trees to prevent
deforestation. Finally, the government cancelled the permit.
 In 1974, the government had announced to auction off around 2000 trees located
near the village Reni in Uttarakhand. Men and women gathered in a peaceful
assembly to protest against this decision.
 Gaurvi Devi, the head of the Mahila Mangal Dal, led a group of 27 women to the
location and started hugging the trees when the loggers did not back down.
 This continued through the night and the loggers eventually left, as they were not
able to do anything.
This incident’s report soon went up to the then Chief Minister, Hemwati Nandan Bahuguna.
It is no secret that we have managed to damage the environment. In the past 30 years, over
24,000 industrial projects have caused deforestation and logging on a massive scale. In 1964
environmentalist and Gandhian social activist Chandi Prasad Bhatt founded a cooperative
organization, Dasholi Gram Swarajya Sangh (later renamed Dasholi Gram Swarajya Mandal
[DGSM]), to foster small industries for rural villagers, using local resources. When industrial
logging was linked to the severe monsoon floods that killed more than 200 people in the
region in 1970, DGSM became a force of opposition against the large-scale industry. The first
Chipko protest occurred near the village of Mandal in the upper Alaknanda valley in April
1973. The villagers, having been denied access to a small number of trees with which to build
agricultural tools, were outraged when the government allotted a much larger plot to a
sporting goods manufacturer. When their appeals were denied, Chandi Prasad Bhatt led
villagers into the forest and embraced the trees to prevent logging. After many days of those
protests, the government canceled the company’s logging permit and granted the original
allotment requested by DGSM. With the success in Mandal, DGSM workers and
Sunderlal Bahuguna, a local environmentalist, began to share Chipko’s tactics with
people in other villages throughout the region. One of the next major protests
occurred in 1974 near the village of Reni, where more than 2,000 trees were
scheduled to be felled. Following a large student-led demonstration, the government
summoned the men of the surrounding villages to a nearby city for compensation,
ostensibly to allow the loggers to proceed without confrontation. However, they were
met with the women of the village, led by Gaura Devi, who refused to move out of the
forest and eventually forced the loggers to withdraw. The action in Reni prompted
the state government to establish a committee to investigate deforestation in the
Alaknanda valley and ultimately led to a 10-year ban on commercial logging in the
area.

Today, we need environmental activists who will stop the unnecessary cutting of trees just to
facilitate projects and feed money-hungry people.

Name-Jatin
Roll no-32