Grassroots workers of Chipko movement be honoured

An organisation of people associated with the Chipko movement of the 1970s has demanded that those who sustained the stir at the grassroots be honoured by the state government on Environment Day next month.
In a letter to Chief Minister Vijay Bahuguna, CHIPKO movement Memorial Foundation convener Ramraj Badoni said those who actively participated in the stir at the grassroots for protecting trees from being felled be honoured by the state government on Environment Day that falls on June 5.
"The contribution of those who sustained the Chipko movement at the grassroots should not be overlooked. So far only individuals who spearheaded the movement have been conferred with big awards like the Padmashree, Padmabhushan and Magsaysay.

"We want that people at the grassroots who imparted momentum to the movement should also get their due," Badoni told PTI.
In his letter to the chief minister, Badoni urged him to ask the District Magistrates to identify Chipko agitationists and their families so that they could be suitably honoured and compensated for their contribution to the movement.
Chipko movement started in the early 1970s in the Garhwal Himalayas of Uttarakhand, then in Uttar Pradesh with growing awareness towards rapid deforestation.

The landmark event in this struggle took place on March 26, 1974, when a group of peasant women in Reni village, Hemwalghati, in Uttarakhand's Chamoli district hugged trees to prevent them from being felled and reclaim their traditional forest rights that were threatened by the contractor system of the state Forest Department.

Their action sparked hundreds of such steps at the grassroots level throughout the region.
By the 1980s the movement had spread throughout India and led to formulation of people-sensitive forest policies, which put a stop to the open felling of trees in regions reaching as far as the Vindhyas and the Western Ghats.