To protect trees from illegal felling and, also, to rejuvenate them, Additional Principal Chief Conservator of Forest, CAMPA, Jharkhand, Sanjeev Kumar, IFS, had started a unique initiative way back in 2005 to save trees by tying the sacred thread of rakhi on them.
Speaking to Indian Masterminds, the officer shared details about the same.
OBJECTIVE
IFS officer Sanjeev Kumar says that there are certain things which connect people emotionally, religion being one. And taking its help, the officer is being able to help the trees conveniently. He started this campaign of trying rakhi on trees to protect and rejuvenate the forests. The other motive of this campaign is to provide employment opportunities and livelihood to the people living in and around the forests. With the support of the local villagers, they initiated Joint Forest Management Committees to work for the protection of forest along with the forest department.
“I have been doing it on the auspicious day of Rakshabandhan since 2005, except for one year of Covid,” Mr. Kumar said.
STARTED IN 2005
The campaign was kicked off in 2005 when Mr. Kumar was posted as DFO in Dhanbad. He says that he got tremendous response from the people there, who wholeheartedly supported the campaign and came forward to save the trees. In the first year of the campaign, they were able to cover 35 villages.
“On the Rakshabandhan day, if we tie a sacred thread around the trees, it will give some sense of ownership to the people and they would feel protective of our mother earth,” he said.
Later, in the next three to four years, he managed to cover the entire district and its 400 villages. “Recently, I visited Dhanbad and people there told me: “Sir this is your forest”, as it is the forest that could survive because of this Rakshabandhan campaign.”
Mr. Kumar took up the same initiative when he was transferred to Jamshedpur in 2011. In fact, he took this initiative to all the districts he was transferred to, including East Singhbhum, Saraikela-Kharswan, Hazaribagh, Koderma, Chatra and Girdih.
People could connect to this rakhi campaign more, as the officer and his team made it a point to talk to the villagers and discuss their problems, as well.
“Whenever we came to know about any health and medical problem that the villagers were facing, we conducted health campaigns in those villages with the help of the health department,” the officer said.
EMPLOYMENT OPPORTUNITIES
He is happy that even after 17 years of the initiation of this campaign, people are still connected to it emotionally, as they are getting livelihood because of those trees. The villagers have grown Mahua, which they collect and sell in the market.
“Now we have proposed that we are going to give some training for value addition so that they can make cakes and biscuits with these minor forest produce. Through this, they will get more livelihood options.”
COVERED MORE THAN 800 VILLAGES
More than 700-800 villages have been covered under this campaign so far. The officer aims to spread this initiative in the entire state. “I ask people to connect with this initiative as much as possible. Not only the people living in forest areas but those who are residing in cities as well. Our cities also require greenery as we are facing a lot many problems because of climate changes,” Mr. Kumar said.
This year they have covered more than 1000 villages with the rakhi initiative, which will spread in the coming years. “We have received very good and positive responses from the people and we are trying to connect with them through other festivals, as well,” he said in conclusion.
