A

Micro Project
On

“CHIPKO MOVEMENT”

Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirement for the award of

Diploma of Engineering
in
Computer Engineering
By

Samar Shrivastava
Kartik Singh
Nihar Kore
Nouman Shaikh

Under the guidance of

NIVIDHA RAUT
Department of Computer Engineering
2023 - 2024
 CERTIFICATE

VIVA COLLEGE OF DIPLOMA ENGINEERING & TECHNOLOGY

VIRAR (W)
2023-24
This is to certify that the micro project entitled Chipko Movement has been submitted
under the guidance of Mrs. Nividha Raut in partial fulfillment of the requirement for the
award of Diploma of Engineering in Computer Engineering from Maharashtra State Board
of Technical Education.

“CHIPKO MOVEMENT”
GROUP MEMBERS

53. Samar Shrivastava

54. Kartik Singh
55. Nihar Kore
56. Nouman Shaikh

Project Guide H.O. D

Mrs. NIVIDHA RAUT Mr. NIKHIL ASOLKAR
 INDEX

Sr. Name of the Page

No. topic no.

PART –A PLAN

1 Brief Introduction 1

2 Aim of the Micro-Project 2

3 Action Plan 3

4 Resources Required 4

PART –B OUTCOMES

1 Brief Description 5-6

2 Course Outcomes Integrated 7

3 Actual Procedure Followed 8-12

4 Outputs of the Micro-Projects 13-14

5 Skill Developed 15
CHIPKO MOVEMENT EST 22447, SEM V

PART-A PLAN
1.0 Brief Introduction

Chipko Movement, started in 1970's, was a nonviolent movement aimed at

protection and conservation of trees and forests from being destroyed. The
name of the Chipko moment originated from the word 'embrace' as the
villagers used to hug the trees and protect them from wood cutters from
cutting them.

The movement originated in the Himalayan region of Uttarakhand (then

part of Uttar Pradesh) in 1973 and quickly spread throughout the Indian
Himalayas. The Hindi word chipko means “to hug” or “to cling to” and
reflects the demonstrators’ primary tactic of embracing trees to impede
loggers.

Sundarlal Bahuguna, a noted environmental activist, and Gaura Devi, a

local woman from Mandal, were among the prominent figures who played
crucial roles in organizing and leading the movement.

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2.0 AIM of Micro-Project

We will study about historical movement, that is Chipko movement,

that how the people in olden times saved thousands of trees and protected our
environment.

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CHIPKO MOVEMENT EST 22447, SEM V

3.0 Action Plan

Sr. Details of Activity Planned Planned Name of Responsible

No Start Date Finish Date Team Members

1 Project selection 15/09/2023 15/09/2023 Kartik Singh, Nihar Kore

2 Identifying /09/2023 /09/2023 Kartik Singh, Nihar Kore

project
outcomes

3 Identifying /09/2023 /09/2023 Kartik Singh, Nihar Kore

resources
required

4 Implementation of /09/2023 /09/2023 Kartik Singh, Nihar Kore

project

5 Final outcome /09/2023 /09/2023 Kartik Singh, Nihar Kore

6 Documentation /09/2023 /09/2023 Kartik Singh, Nihar Kore

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CHIPKO MOVEMENT EST 22447, SEM V

4.0 Resources Required

Sr. Name of Specification Remarks

No Resource

1 Computer HP processor-AMD
System Ryzen 5 -4500u
CPU@1.80GHZ
Ram 8 GB
2 Software __
Package

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CHIPKO MOVEMENT EST 22447, SEM V

PART-B OUTCOME

1.0 Brief Description

Chipko Movement: -
The nonviolent Chipko movement, also referred to as the Chipko Andolan, was
established in the Himalayan area of Uttarakhand in 1973. Since the term
“chipko” literally translates to “hug,” the movement got its name from
protesters who hugged trees to defend them from loggers. Peasants in rural
India, particularly women, started this environmental campaign in the 1970s.
To protect woods and trees from governmental-sponsored logging was the
Chipko movement’s main goal.

What is Chipko Movement?

It is a social-ecological organization that hugged trees to prevent them from
falling and used Gandhian techniques like satyagraha and nonviolent
resistance. Early in the 1970s, as concerns about rapid deforestation grew in
Uttarakhand’s Garhwal Himalayas, the contemporary Chipko movement was
born. In response to the danger posed by the state Forest Department’s
contractor system, a group of peasant women in Uttarakhand, India’s Reni
village, Hemwalghati, Chamoli district, acted on March 26, 1974, to stop tree
cutting and reclaim their customary forest rights.

Thousands of other grassroots activities in the area were inspired by their

actions. The movement gained traction in India by the 1980s, and as a result,
people-sensitive forest policies were created, ending open tree cutting in places
like the Vindhyas and the Western Ghats.

The movement began in the village of Mandal in the state of Uttarakhand

(formerly part of the state of Uttar Pradesh) in the early 1970s. It was initially a
response to the government's decision to allow commercial logging in the
region's forests.
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2.0 Course Outcomes (CO)

a. Develop Public awareness about environment.

e. Manage social issues and Environment Ethics as lifelong learning.

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3.0 Procedure Followed

History: -
With the conclusion of the Sino-Indian border conflict in 1963, the Indian state
of Uttar Pradesh experienced growth in development, especially in the rural
Himalayan regions. The interior roads built for the conflict attracted many
foreign-based logging companies that sought access to the region’s vast forest
resources. Although the rural villagers depended heavily on the forests for
subsistence—both directly, for food and fuel, and indirectly, for services such
as water purification and soil stabilization—government policy prevented the
villagers from managing the lands and denied them access to the lumber. Many
of the commercial logging endeavors were mismanaged, and the clear-cut
forests led to lower agricultural yields, erosion, depleted water resources, and
increased flooding throughout much of the surrounding areas.

The movement: -
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.

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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.
The Chipko movement thus began to emerge as a peasant and women’s
movement for forest rights, though the various protests were largely
decentralized and autonomous. In addition to the characteristic “tree hugging,”
Chipko protesters utilized a number of other techniques grounded in Mahatma
Gandhi’s concept of satyagraha (nonviolent resistance). For example,
Bahuguna famously fasted for two weeks in 1974 to protest forest policy. In
1978, in the Advani forest in the Tehri Garhwal district, Chipko activist
Dhoom Singh Negi fasted to protest the auctioning of the forest, while local
women tied sacred threads around the trees and read from the Bhagavad-Gita.
In other areas, chir pines (Pinus roxburghii) that had been tapped for resin were
bandaged to protest their exploitation. In Pulna village in the Bhyundar valley
in 1978, the women confiscated the loggers’ tools and left receipts for them to
be claimed if they withdrew from the forest. It is estimated that between 1972
and 1979, more than 150 villages were involved with the Chipko movement,
resulting in 12 major protests and many minor confrontations in Uttarakhand.
The movement’s major success came in 1980, when an appeal from Bahuguna
to Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi resulted in a 15-year ban on
commercial felling in the Uttarakhand Himalayas. Similar bans were enacted in
Himachal Pradesh and the former Uttaranchal.
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Chipko Movement Leaders: -

One of the most striking aspects of Chipko was the extensive participation of
female villagers. Due to the agrarian economy that was the backbone of
Uttarakhand, women were most directly affected by environmental
deterioration and deforestation, making it easier for them to connect to the
problems. How much this engagement impacted or resulted from Chipko’s
beliefs has been fiercely debated in academic circles.
Despite this, both male and female activists played significant roles in the
fight, including Gaura Devi, Sudesha Devi, and Ghanasyam Raturi, a Chipko
poet whose songs are still popular in the Himalayan region. Sunderlal
Bahuguna received the Padma Vibhushan in 2009, and Chandi Prasad Bhatt
received the Ramon Magsaysay Award in 1982.

Gaura Devi and the Chipko Movement in Reni:

In January, 1974, the government auctioned 2500 trees in Reni, Garhwal. The
villagers, knowing how crucial the trees were to their survival, were
determined to protect them. On March 26, the day the lumberjacks were to
come, the men of the village were tricked into going away, leaving only the
women and children.
When the loggers arrived Gaura Devi, head of the women's forest protection
group in Reni, with 27 other women, stopped them. They tried to talk and
reason but were shouted at and abused. The women hugged the trees,
preventing them from being cut, and staved off the loggers for the whole night.
The men of Reni returned only the next day. After a 4-day confrontation the
loggers finally left.

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Chipko Movement and Sundarlal Bahuguna:

Sundarlal Bahuguna, a well-known Gandhian, is the movement’s head. (1927–
2021). Additionally, he is attributed with coming up with the Chipko slogan,
“Ecology is the Permanent Economy.” Later, during the 1970s Chipko
movement, he propagated the notion that ecology and habitats are more
important.
He also thought that environment and the economy should coexist. Sundarlal
Bahuguna enlightened the locals by highlighting the importance of trees in the
environment because they stop soil erosion, create clean air, and bring about
rain. Prime Minister Gandhi’s choice to enact the 1980 green-felling ban was
also influenced by Bahuguna.
Impact: His efforts, along with those of other activists in the Chipko
Movement, led to the Indian government imposing a 15-year ban on tree
felling in the Himalayan region of Uttarakhand, marking a significant victory
for environmental conservation.
Legacy: Sundarlal Bahuguna's legacy extends beyond the Chipko Movement.
He continued to work on environmental and social issues throughout his life,
earning recognition and awards for his dedication to the cause of
environmental protection.

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Lasting Impact: -
The Chipko movement had a significant impact on India’s environmental
vision and imagination. It united diverse concerns and groups, offering
important lessons to new social movements globally. The movement
empowered local communities, raised environmental awareness, and
influenced policy changes that promote sustainable forest management and the
protection of the environment.
The Chipko movement adhered to strictly nonviolent protest tactics, similar to
many other resistance movements that have occurred on the Indian
subcontinent. It resulted in decade-long tree-felling bans in numerous forests in
the Himalayas, protecting the people and resources of rural India.
As the movement continued, protests became more project-oriented and
expanded to include the entire ecology of the region, ultimately becoming the
“Save Himalaya” movement. Between 1981 and 1983, Bahuguna marched
5,000 km (3,100 miles) across the Himalayas to bring the movement to
prominence.
Throughout the 1980s many protests were focused on the Tehri dam on the
Bhagirathi River and various mining operations, resulting in the closure of at
least one limestone quarry. Similarly, a massive reforestation effort led to the
planting of more than one million trees in the region.
In 2004 Chipko protests resumed in response to the lifting of the logging ban in
Himachal Pradesh but were unsuccessful in its reenactment.

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4.0 Outputs of Micro-Projects

Here are some advantages and disadvantages of the Chipko movement:

Advantages:
1. The Chipko movement was a non-violent protest that used Gandhian
techniques like satyagraha and nonviolent resistance to achieve its goals.
2. The movement was started by peasants, particularly women, who were
directly affected by environmental deterioration and deforestation.
3. The Chipko movement inspired many other grassroots activities in the
area, which led to the creation of people-sensitive forest policies and ended
open tree cutting in places like the Vindhyas and the Western Ghats.
4. The Chipko movement demonstrated how environmental causes, up until
then considered an activity of the rich, were a matter of life and death for
the poor, who were all too often the first ones to be devastated by an
environmental tragedy.
Disadvantages:
1. The Chipko movement was criticized for being too localized and not
having a broader impact on environmental policy in India.
2. The movement was also criticized for being anti-development and not
taking into account the economic needs of the country.
3. Some critics argued that the Chipko movement’s focus on hugging trees
was symbolic and did not address the root causes of deforestation and
environmental degradation.
Overall, the Chipko movement played an important role in raising awareness
about environmental issues in India and inspiring other grassroots movements
around the world.

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5.0 Skill Developed

Thus, we have studied about historical movement of Chipko movement,

that how the environmentalists of olden India saved thousands of trees and
protect our environment.

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