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Bamboo liberation day - new

 

Live from Mendha Lekha -Updates

Aparna Pallavi - Live from Mendha Lekha

Rural communities win right over bamboo, finally

A large crowd gathered at Mendha Lekha village in Maharashtra's Gadchiroli district in the morning on April 27 to witness a historic event. The state forest department handed over a transit passbook to the village community leader Devaji Tofa, signifying the village gram sabha would henceforth exercise the power to issue transit passes for selling bamboo harvested from the nearby forests.

Jairam Ramesh withdraws guidelines violating FRA

The Ministry of Environment and Forests has withdrawn its latest guidelines for creating inviolate space for wildlife. The guidelines for creating Critical wildlife Habitat (CWH), issued on February 7, violated the Forest Rights Act, 2006, and threatened the interests of the forest dwellers (see:  ‘Misguided rules’).

No consensus on FRA review

Top forest officials and members of the National Forest Rights Act Committee are on a collision course after the panel submitted its report to the government and stated that the Act was not implemented in its true spirit.

Grassroots victory

THE past two rainy seasons 65-year-old Ramdas Rana has spent much of his sleeping hours adjusting his bed to an elusive dry patch. The thatched roof of his hut has been leaking since 2008. He could not repair it because the grass used for thatching is out of bounds for him.

Is bamboo a tree or a grass?

The definition is contested as the answer has immense economic implications. If bamboo is a tree or timber, it belongs to the forest department and can be auctioned to the paper and pulp industry, often at throwaway rates.

The unfolding story

Red Letter Day for bamboo

Mendha Lekha's struggle for bamboo rights

In 2008, the village applied for the right over 18 sq km of village forest area under the Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of Forest Rights) Act, 2006 Read full story: Give us 18 sq km In 2009, Mendha Lekha alongwith Marda village became the first villages in the country to win community rights under the Forest Rights Act.