Jungle Ki Sherni

Background

Kandoni Soren of Jharkhand organised 40 women from her tribe to safeguard their forest and natural resources from illegal tree cutters.

About Jungle Ki Sherni’ & Her Team

• Every morning, armed with sticks and bow arrows, a group of indigenous women from Sarkaghat leave their homes. They march together to the Jharkhand forest that borders their village, then disperse into the deeper areas.
• They keep an eye out for persons who enter the forest for the purpose of unlawful tree felling and prevent them from stealing their valuable resources.
• Kandoni, a Jamshedpur Police house guard, is the driving force behind this programme, which she started in 2011.
• Many outsiders enter the forest to make use of its resources. However, they frequently go too far and exploit the land. They are gangs and mafias with a long history of criminal activity.
• According to Kandoni, many rural people had already begun to experience the effects of environmental degradation and had begun migrating to other cities in search of alternative means of income.
• The organisation has grown to 40 members throughout the years. They patrol the forest 24 hours a day and defend their natural resources.
• They planned shifts and marked out the forest's boundaries. Some high-risk zones or isolated places require extra care, thus they are divided into four teams and shifts are scheduled accordingly.
• This initiative has resulted in an 80-90 percent reduction in unlawful tree felling. 

Quote: “Conservation is a positive exercise of skill and insight, not merely a negative exercise of abstinence and caution.”- Aldo Leopold

Source:

• Meet ‘Jungle Ki Sherni’ & Her Team, Lone Guardians of A 250-Acre Forest in Jharkhand: