NITI: At 67, Bali Devi’s eyes light up at the mention of the word ‘andolan’. The grit and determination she and other women of this village displayed in 1974 when they hugged their trees in the face of abuse and threats from 200 axe men are still evident as she reminisces about the Chipko Movement.
Bali Devi’s memories of the day are crystal clear. The date was March 26, 1974. The men of the village had been invited to the district headquarters to receive their seasonal compensation for land taken over by the Army after the Chinese war. This was a ploy to keep them away from the village that night.
As it turned dark, 200 axe men led by a contractor quietly entered the forest. Their task: To fell as many trees before the men returned in the morning. But the gutsy women of the village decided to fight it out. Led by Gaura Devi and Bali Devi, they hugged the trees and stuck to it all night.
Bali Devi was one of the key participants in the Chipko Movement then. As president of the Mahila Mangal Dal now, she still continues with her non-violent agitations to protect, trees, forests and rivers.
“After every natural disaster, governments talk big but do nothing till another disaster strikes,” she says in an exclusive chat with New Indian Express at her home in Reni village where the Chipko andolan began and made the world sit up and take notice.
“Since the Chipko Movement, foreign countries have understood the perils of not protecting the environment but in our country we are doing exactly the opposite: chopping trees and destroying forests. In the name of hydro-electric projects, we build dams across rivers by upsetting the balance of nature. Tragedies like the one in Kedarnath in 2013 will happen again and again if we don’t save our eco-system,” she warns.
Several decades after Chipko Movement, the elderly woman says the fight is far from over. “The Chipko andolan was successful but the problems have not ended. In 1982, our forest was declared the Nanda Devi National Park. In 1992 it became the Nanda Devi Biosphere Reserve and the government took complete control of the forest and the natural resources in this area, thereby denying us our traditional rights. We staged several protests but the governments of the day are just not bothered. They just labelled us as thieves.
I never imagined that so many decades after the Chipko Movement we would be dispossessed of our forests, which we worship. But our fight is on.’’ The villagers of Reni, Lata and other habitations here used to be successful traders. But after the India-China war in 1962, when the trade route to Tibet was closed, most of them turned to farming.
But the demarcation of the Nanda Devi National Park made the forest out of bounds to them, not allowing them to graze their sheep, gather food and medicinal herbs. “The forest was our lifeline... Today, many of villagers are finding it difficult to eke out a livelihood,” says Bali Devi adding that the issue of Nanda Devi still remains an emotive issue for villagers here.
Bali Devi is among the few from the Chipko Movement still alive. “Our leader Gaura Devi is dead and so are many of the other women who participated in the andolan. But I will continue to fight. In the last few months, we have been protesting the construction of dams but the government has not been paying heed,” she says.
Bali Davi says life has changed a lot for her and for her fellow villagers since Chipko: “Back then we used to be rich, culturally and socially. Today, no one is interested in their culture and traditions. That feeling of oneness is not there. There is too much influence of TV and other consumer products. There is an urgent need to retain our culture and traditions.”
Bali Devi sings a ditty from the Chipko Movement: “Come sisters, come brothers/we’ll save the forests, our forests/we will protect and/we will drive the contractor away”. And after a pause, she adds, “I will not give up.”