Indigenous Philosophies of the Himalayan Communities

Cosmic Worldviews

Bunty Mondal reports on the outcome of a national seminar on Himalayan communities (SNS)

A NATIONAL seminar on the “Indigenous Philosophies of the Himalayan Communities” took place on 8 and 9 May in the Don Bosco School, Malbasey, premises, located in the lap of the east Himalayas. Twenty-four scholars representing the 300-plus communities residing in these mountainous regions, constituting 18 per cent of the land mass and two per cent of India’s population, gathered in the company of 50 other participants to listen to research papers and test their own acquired indigenous knowledge.

Organised by the Salesian College, Sonada, in collaboration with the Indian Council of Philosophical Research, a Union human resource development ministry concern, the aim was to promote philosophical studies in the country. This first-of-a-kind seminar in Sikkim was also another first in its execution through a collaborative venture of two educational institutions – a college and an ICSE higher secondary school.

Besides the inaugural session, there were five sessions of two hours’ duration, during each of which four scholars presented their themes. The seminar was inaugurated by Rt Rev Bishop Stephen Lepcha, Bishop of Darjeeling, and the presidential address of the Vice-Chancellor of Sikkim University, Professor Mahendra P Lama, was read out by the finance officer of the university. The keynote address was delivered by Professor Mrinal Miri, former Vice-Chancellor of Nehu and director of the Indian Institute of Advanced Studies, Shimla. The welcome addresses were delivered by Fr Tomy Augustine, SDB, rector, Salesian College, and Fr George Thirumalachalil, SDB, rector and principa,l Don Bosco School. The message from the member secretary of ICPR, Professor G Mishra, and the address by Fr George Thadathil, placing the seminar in context, brought to conclusion the inaugural session.

The research papers presented dwelt on the various communities, ranging from the Dogras in Jammu and Kashmir in the north-west, to the Wanchos of Arunachal Pradesh in the north-east. The focal discussion revolved around the hill communities of the Darjeeling-Sikkim region, among whom the prominent attention went to the Lepchas, the Rais and the Tamangs. The Nagas, the Adi and Tani group of Assam-Arunachal tribes also featured among the papers presented, their philosophies underlying the folklore, the myths, the arts and literature and how they all contain cosmic worldviews that predate the meta-cosmic religious outlooks was a recurring theme.

The discussions lead to the conclusion that these traditional perceptions contain a cosmo-theandric vision of reality that is compatible with every major religion, be it Hinduism, Buddhism, Christianity or Islam. The religions that have made inroads into these communities over the past centuries have succeeded in varying degrees to appreciate their indigenous worldviews and have done service towards the preservation of their cultures. The Himalayan communities, in turn, situated as they are at the crossroads of two or more civilisations across the great divide of mountainous region, have acted as transmitters as well as preservers of distinct worldviews by promoting pluralism within their cultures, languages and religions.

The two-day seminar left a sense of satisfaction among the organisers, resource persons as well as participants. There were cultural insights into the art forms of the local communities provided through the dances performed by the local school children from in and around Soreng. The valedictory session saw the distribution of certificates and mementos, after the wise summations of the highlights of the seminar by Professor Mrinal Miri, Professor G Mishra, N Parthasarathy and Fr George Thadathil.

Tribal boomerang

POLITICAL expediency generally demands that party leaders target each other’s policies and claim something or the other will boomerang in the long run. As far that readers know from newspaper reports on the failure of the Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee-Bimal Gurung talks on the Gorkhaland issue and the agitation that began spreading towards the Dooars, the West Bengal chief minister feared there would be unrest and peace would be disturbed. But the Akhil Bharatiya Adivasi Vikas Parishad and its Terai-Dooars Coordination Committee then began opposing the Gorkhaland agitators, obviously on instructions from Alimuddin Street. What happened then in the Dooars belt was enough to reveal that the ABAVP activists were following the guidelines of Left leaders. They were also invited to Kolkata to present their demands, which were considered “dead” even before this event took place.
As a bhumiputra (son of the soil) of the Dooars, born and brought up in the Katalguri Tea Estate which has been closed since 2002, I would like to reveal that the name and fame of the ABAVP had not been heard of when tribal workers were starving and the death toll kept mounting. Tribal activists and ABAVP supporters should be thankful to the Gorkha Jana Mukti Morcha agitators and the West Bengal chief minister for ensuring the talks failed so as to pave the way for an alternative. The demand to open the closed tea gardens in the Dooars was placed by the Gorkhas and Adivasis who observed an indefinite hungerstrike.
Before the polls in the Dooars belt, especially in the Diana Tea Estate under Banarhat police station, tension prevailed following the standoff between the GJMM and ABAVP. As part of the poll campaign, the newly formed Gorkha Adivasi Mukti Morcha then started to rally support but was attacked by the ABAVP.
When the demands by the tribal activists were not considered genuine, they chose to boycott the poll which was expected to go against the ruling party. But during his campaign, Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee requested the Adivasis to withdraw their boycott and the very next day a senior ABAVP leader announced his acceptance in Kolkata, but this was not followed by leaders active in the Dooars belt, one of the reasons being that Manik Sanyal, CPI(M) secretary, Jalpaiguri unit, had said, “The ABAVP demands are illogical.” Later, however, with the situation continuing to remain unsettled, Sanyal promised, “We are working for the overall development of the tribals.”
That these tribal activists refused to vote was all very well, but that they prevented others from exercising their voting rights was undemocratic and illegal. Eight persons were arrested from Malbazar for allegedly preventing people from voting. Following the poll boycott call by the ABAVP, no votes were cast in 17 booths in the Alipurduar parliamentary constituency and a poor voter turnout was also noticed in the Banarhat, Kumargram, Falakata and Nagrakata areas. The CPI(M)’s Jalpaiguri district secretariat members were disturbed and discontented with such activities which they considered was an unhealthy sign for democracy. But the Congress leaders of Jalpaiguri district held the state government responsible for the low voter turnout. The Left trade unions have taken the poll boycott and low voters’ turnout seriously and decided to probe the problem with the focus on tribal grievances.
The Centre of Indian Trade Unions, All India Trade Union Congress, United Trade Union Congress and Trade Union Coordination Centre are alarmed at the extent of the indifference among tribal voters in the Terai and Dooars belts. The Citu believes the tea workers are its traditional vote bank.
The most vital and annoying point regarding the grievances and problems of the tribal community in the Terai and Dooars belts is that they feel political parties and state government officials are more concerned about the problems of refugees from Bangladesh since they are the real sympathisers of Bengali-speaking people, and are ready to provide them whatever facilities possible. Neither political leaders nor the trade unions have fathomed this as being the cause of unrest and discontent among the Adivasis. So these leaders have their work cut out.
The TDCC of the ABAVP has alleged that the police had tortured its supporters on the ground that a group of them had torched the old wooden structure of the Nagrakata police station on 5 February this year. The administration filed an FIR against 8,009 ABAVP supporters and since then the police has been arresting them, harassing their family members and raiding their houses randomly.
Mentioning their allegations against the police, the organisation submitted a memorandum to the district magistrate of Jalpaiguri that contained an offer to surrender before the administration. That date was set as 18 May 2009. During the bandh called by the TDCC, tourism in Dooars was badly affected, as happened in Darjeeling. Tribal activists locked the Madarihat Panchayat Samity office, but before doing this they forced the BDO and staff to leave. The Banarhat Merchant Association threatened to stop the supply of food to the tea plantation areas till the situation returned to normal. Due to the TDCC bandh call, bus and train services were cancelled and weekly haats could not be held. When the situation turned serious, the Jalpaiguri district magistrate decided to take bold steps and declared that force would be applied to restore normality in the Dooars.
The TDDC, seeing no way out, withdrew the bandh without giving any reason. They had called the bandh for the release of two activists who had been arrested a few days ago for vandalising six houses in Nagrakata on 30 April 2009 during voting. During the bandh, the activists, armed with bows and arrows, staged road shows and roadblocks in several parts of the Dooars. They were also said to have ransacked shops in Binaguri and Banarhat.
Workers’ unions in the Dooars have since admitted their failure to do anything for the development of tribals in the tea belts. Chita De, veteran leader of the Tea Plantation Workers’ Union, admitted that introspection was needed before condemning the ABAVP agitation. National Union of Plantation Workers joint secretary Mani Darnal has also admitted that workers’ unions had lost control over a large section of the Adivasi people, due to negligence of their problems. All India Hind Majdur Union general secretary Samir Roy felt that the CPI(M) tried to go one better over the GJMM by encouraging the ABAVP in the Terai and Dooars belts, but the Adivasis were denting the CPI(M)’s support base.Birkha
Khadka
Duvarseli
The author is a Darjeeling-based political analyst.

Afforestation – Fighting Climate Change

Afforestation – Fighting Climate Change 
Kalpana Palkhiwala

“Stockholm was without doubt the landmark event in the growth of international environmentalism”, wrote John McCormick in the book Reclaiming Paradise. “It was the first occasion on which the political, social and economic problems of the global environment were discussed at an intergovernmental forum with a view to actually taking corrective action.” 

The UN General Assembly established the World Environment Day (WED) in 1972 to mark the opening of the Stockholm Conference on Human Environment, observed on 5th June every year. World Environment Day is one of the principle vehicles through which the United Nations stimulates worldwide awareness of the environment and enhances political attention. The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), also established in 1972, uses WED to stimulate consciousness on the environment and mobilize public action. 

The agenda of the World Environment Day is to give a human face to environmental issues, empower people to become agents of sustainable and equitable development, promote an understanding that communities are pivotal to changing attitudes regarding the environment and advocate partnership across localities, regions and nations to ensure that all people enjoy a safer and more prosperous future.

The theme for WED 2009 is ‘Your Planet Needs you- Unite to Combat Climate Change’. The theme reflects the urgency for nations to agree on a new deal at the climate convention meeting in Copenhagen some 180 days later in the year, and marks conceptual links between overcoming poverty and improving management of forests. This year’s host of the World Environment Day is Mexico. 

Mexico, a country at the crossroads of the Green Economy and increasingly at the centre of regional and global affairs in the fight against climate change will host the International 2009 World Environment Day celebrations. The decision to choose Mexico as the host reflects the growing practical and political role of this Latin American country in the fight against climate change, including its growing participation in carbon markets. UNEP has now launched a new and more ambitious phase-the Seven Billion Tree Campaign. 

Holding front for afforestation and climate change

Planting, nurturing, preserving and conserving plants and trees is a deep rooted practice with historical significance in India. In some communities, a prayer is said and forgiveness is sought from the tree before cutting it. Sacred groves are common throughout India, where clusters of plants and trees are protected and worshipped for prosperity. Hinduism, Jainism and Buddhism articulate respect for plants and trees, treating them as living beings. Buddhist monks, constantly on the move to preach, halt their travels during monsoon to ensure they do not destroy saplings and sprouted seeds. Jainism forbids the consumption of sprouts which are considered nascent life that should be allowed to grow. Festivals related to trees abound. One such festival is Van Mahotsav, initiated in 1950 by Shri K. M. Munshi, the then Union Minister for Agriculture and Food, a visionary who sought to enthuse people about conservation of forests and trees.

This week-long festival of tree planting is organised every year in July in a bid to retain the vanishing forest cover of the country. Cutting down trees on a massive scale has greatly affected the environment and it is imperative to do something about forests’ conservation. Planting of trees is a symbolic gesture to celebrate our reverence for all things that grow in the forest.

NAEB

The National Afforestation and Eco-Development Board (NAEB) in the Ministry of Environment and Forests is responsible for promoting afforestation, tree planting, ecological restoration and eco-development activities in the country, with special attention to degraded forest areas and lands adjoining forests, national parks, sanctuaries and other protected areas as well as the ecologically fragile Western Himalayas, Aravalis and Western Ghats.

NAP

The National Afforestation Programme (NAP) Scheme is the flagship scheme of NAEB, providing physical and institutional support to Forest Development Agencies (FDAs), which are a major step towards the institutionalization of Joint Forest Management. The FDA has been conceived and established as a federation of Joint Forest Management Committees (JFMCs) at the Forest Division level to undertake holistic development of forests with people's participation. The objectives of the scheme are:

• Protection and conservation of natural resources through the active involvement of communities

• Checking land degradation, deforestation and loss of biodiversity

• Ecological restoration, environmental conservation and eco-development

• Building the capacity of village level organization to manage natural resources in and around villages in a sustainable manner

• Fulfillment of the broader objectives of productivity, equity, and sustainability for the common good

• Improve quality of life and subsistence of people living in and around forests and

• Capability endowment and skill enhancement for improving the employability of the rural people

All 28 states, including the Autonomous Hill Districts (AHDC) are covered by this program, as are wildlife areas. Rehabilitation of abandoned, degraded shifting cultivation regions and regeneration of medicinal plants is also undertaken.

Achievements

• 795 FDAs have been operationalised so far since the launch of the FDA mechanism in 2000-01, at a cost of Rs. 2,675.26 crores to treat a total area of 157.90 lakh ha. (as on 31.3.2009). Rehabilitation of shifting cultivation lands have been given specific focus under the programme, and 34 jhum projects have been sanctioned in NE States and in Orissa.

• As on 31.3.2009, Rs. 345.62 crore was released to FDAs during the year 2008-09 for implementation of National Afforestation Programme. (NAP)

• 97 million human days of work were generated, benefiting approximately 12 million households which included 22% Scheduled Castes and 38% Scheduled Tribes.

• Around 5.3 million households in project villages which had 25% Scheduled Caste and 21% Scheduled Tribe were covered and

• Entry-point activity beneficiaries are estimated to be around 1.92 million households out of which 23% were Scheduled Castes and 27% were Scheduled Tribes. 

Eco-Development Forces (EDF) Scheme 

The Eco Task Forces (ETFs) Scheme was initiated by the Ministry of Defence in 1982 with a view to securing involvement of ex-servicemen in afforestation and eco-development in remote areas to restore degraded ecosystems through afforestation, soil conservation and water resource management. The Scheme has been in operation for the past four plans.

There are currently six Eco-Task Force Battalions raised through ex-servicemen/Territorial Army Personnel. They cover the Shivalik Hills, Uttarakhand; Rajasthan Cannal, Bajju; Jammu and Kashmir; Pithoragarh, Uttarakhand; Sonitpur (West) and Haltugaon, Assam.

Proposed Gram Van Yojana Scheme 

Gram/Panchayat Van Yojana, a new scheme is proposed which will involve Panchayati Raj Institutions in afforestation/tree planting in non forest lands.

India released its National Action Plan on Climate Change (NAPPC) on 30th June 2008 to outline its strategy of climate change. The National Action Plan advocates a strategy that promotes the adaptation to climate change and enhancing the sustainability of India’s development path. Eight National Missions on Climate Change 

The National Solar Mission aims at increasing the share of solar energy in the total energy mix through development of new solar technologies, while attempting to expand the scope of other renewable and non fossil options such as nuclear energy, wind energy and biomass. The National Mission on Enhanced Energy Efficiency comprises four new initiatives, namely, a market based mechanism for trading in certified energy savings in energy intensive large industries and facilities, accelerating the shift to energy efficient appliances in designated sectors, demand side management programmes in all sectors by capturing future energy savings, and developing fiscal instruments to promote energy efficiency. The National Mission on Sustainable Habitat attempts to promote energy efficiency in buildings, management of solid waste and modal shift to public transport including transport options based on bio-diesel and hydrogen. The National Water Mission has, as its objective, the conservation of water, minimizing wastage and ensuring more equitable distribution both across and within states.

The National Mission for sustaining the Himalayan Ecosystem is aimed at evolving management measures for sustaining and safeguarding the Himalayan glacier and mountain eco system. The National Mission for a Green India focuses on enhancing eco system services and carbon sinks through afforestation on degraded forest land in line with the national policy of expanding forest and tree cover to 33% of the total land area of the country. The National Mission for Sustaining Agriculture will develop strategies to make Indian agriculture more resilient to climate change through new varieties of thermal productivity of rain fed agriculture. The National Mission on Strategic Knowledge for Climate Change is intended to identify the challenges of and response to climate change through research and technology development and ensure funding of high quality and focused research into aspects of climate change. (PIB)

* Deputy Director, PIB, Delhi.