Nayagarh: Several studies and reports have found that local communities play a major role in the conservation of forests. A great reminder of this is the Chipko Movement, where women resisted deforestation in Uttar Pradesh (now Uttarakhand).
A case in point will be the tribal women of Odisha, who have been guarding their forests against smugglers for many decades — voluntarily. Armed with nothing but a stick, women go into local forests in groups of three to six to drive the timber mafias away.
If they catch one, they issue a warning and confiscate the produce being smuggled. When matters escalate, they either bring these thieves to the village meeting and demand a public apology or fine or involve an NGO to initiate police action.
This is thengapali, a practice where every household takes turns to patrol their community forest with a stick (thenga means stick and pali means turn). Thengapali started in Nayagarh district in the early 1970s but became popular in the 1990s when women came forward to protect forests alongside men.
Women are solely responsible for keeping vigil on the forests in at least 300 villages in Nayagarh. In the Gunduribadi village of the district, the women-led forest protection committee has rejuvenated at least 500 acres of forest land as smuggling of timber and other forest produce has reduced.
“We can spot the Giant Indian Squirrel in the Nayagarh belt, which wasn’t the case a decade ago. Even the soil moisture retention has improved,” said Manas Mishra, an environment activist who has studied the forest-dwelling communities of the Nayagarh-Khurda belt.
Thengapali has spread to other districts as well. The presence of women sentinels in smaller pockets of the Mayurbhanj district, such as Punasia, has brought down the menace of smuggling.
They provide an extra layer of surveillance to the forests within the Similipal Tiger Reserve in Mayurbhanj. Dhaneswar Mahanta, who works with Vasundhara in the Reserve limits said, “The forest department deploys two to five guards per forest.
On that, these committees send at least three volunteers through the day.” The practice has also crossed over to the bordering state of Jharkhand and has become a case study that is now studied in the schools of Hampshire in England.
According to Y. Giri Rao, executive director of Vasundhara, a non-profit organisation that documents the forest conservation methods in Odisha, natural resources mean a lot more to women than men.
“If the forest cover is depleted, the women would have to walk an extra mile to collect fuel for their daily needs,” he said. This dependence encouraged Sudamani Mahakud to take up thengapali at Punasia village.
“If I need fuel to cook food, I can take leaves and twigs from the forest. If I need food to eat, the forest can give me greens and tubers. Some trees also have medicinal value. They are a source of food for the cattle as well. What more reasons do I need to protect the forest? I exist because the forest does,” explained the 65-year-old, who has been guarding the forests for over two decades.
No sooner did women start protecting local forests, the conflict with the smugglers reduced. “If a group of men would confront smugglers, there were chances of fights. With women, there would only be verbal exchanges. In most cases, the smugglers belonged to neighbouring villages and so they would avoid confrontation with these women,” said Sanjukta Basa, who runs NGO Sangram in the Mayurbhanj district.
The rules of patrolling are decided mutually, factoring in when women can take time off from their domestic duties. If three women go for the 6 am-9 am shift, the second group goes out between 9 am and 12 pm.
This continues till 9 pm or 11 pm. Guidelines to collect the forest produce are also laid down. For instance, a villager can take bamboo only after getting approval from the village committee.
PNN