The iconic images of Garhwali peasant women hugging trees, apparently to protect them from being cut down, have become synonymous with the Chipko movement. The movement began in 1973 in Uttarakhand, then a part of Uttar Pradesh, by communities against commercial tree-felling that led to degradation of forests and natural disasters. Their demands were clear: Abolish the contract system of tree-felling and establish the rights of communities over the management and use of forests. In the beginning, the focus was on development of the local economy through promotion of small-scale forest-based industries while ensuring conservation of the natural environment for easy and adequate supply of water and biomass for domestic needs.
Though women were the backbone of the Chipko movement, the “Occasional Monograph” published by the Centre for Women’s Development Studies (CWDS) in 1987 points out that there remains a gap in providing an adequate “insight into the role and contribution of women in the genesis, growth and later development in the movement”. In order to fill in this gap referred to in the CWDS monograph, this is an attempt to look at the historical background for the reason for participation of women in large numbers in Chipko. For this, we have selected the contributions of two leading social activists for detailed study: Vimla Bahuguna and Sarla Behn.
“Vimla Bahuguna is not known to the world outside as is her husband Sunderlal Bahuguna,” wrote academic Madhu Kishwar in the magazine Manushi (1992, No. 70), “but this frail and diminutive woman has been a full partner with her husband in the Chipko movement.” Although, all her life she has preferred to remain in the shadow of her internationally famous environmentalist husband, she has always been his pillar of strength and source of inspiration. Madhu Pathak, their daughter, read out to us from an old diary which she discovered among the papers of her late father where he had expressed admiration for her mother and acknowledged her strong influence in his life. There is no doubt that behind her fragile physical frame there is a “rock like” confident yet compassionate mind and firm determination of commitment to serve the less privileged.
She was born as Vimla Nautiyal in 1932 in Malideval in Tehri. Her father was a forest department official. This provided plenty of opportunities to wander in the forests of the Himalayas. This instilled in her a deep attachment to nature. This was the time when the anti-British freedom movement was going on all over India. But Tehri was ruled by a king; and the society by patriarchal norms. Education of girls was restricted to a privileged few. Brothers of Vimla got involved in the struggle to depose the ruling king. Both her brothers were imprisoned. The struggle of the brothers for a greater cause inspired Vimla. She developed an urge to join the struggle against the repressive autocratic ruler but could not because of the existing social constraints for girls against stepping out in public. So, the young Vimla decided to support the struggle from the backstage.
In 1950, Vimla joined Kasturba Mahila Utthan Mandal, Lakshmi Ashram in Kosani, founded by Katherine Hillman. Katherine, better known as Sarla Behn, was a follower of Gandhian thought. She worked for the development and expansion of Mahatma Gandhi’s constructive programme in the remote villages of Uttarakhand. Life in this institution significantly influenced the formation of her philosophy of life and in developing her personality. Sarla Behn left a deep impression on her and all through her life remained her guiding spirit. Sarla Behn inspired Vimla to dedicate her life to the service of the less privileged.
Here, Sarla Behn noted that “the ladies are the symbol of physical labour.” She was distressed to find that though these courageous and hardworking women bore all the household responsibilities, undertook farm work and cattle rearing, “filling the stores with grains,” these real “Goddesses of Wealth” suffered from low self-esteem, compared themselves with “beasts of burden” and surrendered to their fate that they were born to labour. They hesitated to come out into the public sphere, to attend meetings, saying, “All we know is work. Meetings and other social activities are meant for men.”
Sarla Behn committed herself to the task of awakening the women of the mountain villages from their slumber and instilling self-confidence in them. With this aim, the Kasturba Mahila Utthan Mandal, an educational ashram for girls, was founded in August 1946. This was the first basic education school in the Himalayas. The curriculum of the basic education programme included imparting practical training in the skills of daily life, like “farming, animal husbandry and domestic science” with a view to “inculcate self-confidence in them.” “We gave our students such household work as going to the forest to gather firewood, fetching water from the springs, and cleansing the grain. In the afternoons they would sit in the sun facing the Himalayas, and learn to read and write,” Sarla Behn wrote in the book A Life in Two Worlds, Autobiography of Mahatma Gandhi’s English Disciple. Girls were trained in health and hygiene and social work. So that later, they could start health centres and spread awareness among the women of their respective villages, said Vimla in an interview.
The beginning
Vimla agreed to marry Sunderlal Bahuguna, the then president of Tehri Congress. Sunderlal was deeply influenced by the life and thoughts of the freedom fighters Sridev Suman and Gandhi. Vimla had a condition for Sunderlal: he had to give up city life and political activities, settle in a village, and establish an ashram. So, both could carry forward the legacy of Sarla Behn in the implementation of the village upliftment programme. On June 19, 1956, the Parvatiya Navjeevan Mandal, the ashram in the remote village of Silyara some 36 km from Tehri, was established where the couple got married on the same day. Sarla Behn wrote in her autobiography that it was decided that they would remain dependent on local help and support, along with the output of their own labour, to meet the daily needs. Sunderlal would not just work on his own land but also labour in the fields of other village residents during harvest and accept grains in lieu.
“This unique couple, thus, put into practice the Gandhian idea of social reconstruction by sinking into the masses and working for their uplift. The couple worked with the local people, helped them to develop improved methods of farming and animal husbandry to get better yields, to make them aware of the benefits of nutritious and balanced diet for good health, to construct small irrigation canals by collective, voluntary labour. They also began to teach the children in the evenings,” Kishwar wrote in Manushi. However, as Silyara and its adjoining areas were backward in every sense of the term, there was absolutely no scope for education for girls. Moreover, as “life in the mountains is totally dependent on the labour of women,” people had never given any thought about educating girls. Inheritance of Sarla Behn’s commitment to educate women, to develop their potential and self-respect, was deeply imprinted in the mind of Vimla. Women had no spare time during the day due to excessive workload. Hence, Vimla began to educate girls and women in the evenings. The involvement of the couple in activities promoting community interest earned them the confidence of the local people. In an interview, Vimla mentioned that she always kept a box of ayurvedic and homeopathic medicines to treat the village residents with common ailments or in emergency.
In his 15-point programme for social reconstruction, Gandhi had identified alcoholism as a social problem and recommended prohibition. Indeed, for Uttarakhand, alcohol addiction was a major social problem. Since 1962, people have been raising the demand for prohibition. Consumption of alcohol by men caused much distress and unhappiness among women. Earnings of women made through hard work were used up in consumption of alcohol by men. Besides, it also impacted the overall family well-being; caused health problems; and education of children. Drunkenness also caused several accidental deaths on the difficult mountain roads.
Birth of the movement
Vimla and Sunderlal started a crusade against illegal liquor brewing and trade. In 1965, when the state government wanted to open a liquor shop near Silyara, they organised the local people to oppose this. They formed a prohibition committee to sensitise the people against the sale and consumption of alcohol. Ram Lila (rendition of the epic Ramayana) was organised to attract people and then to spread the message of prohibition. Women of Ghansali were the first to raise their voices in favour of prohibition. By the end of the year, the anti-liquor movement spread all over Uttarakhand. Thousands of women participated in the movement. They organised demonstrations, picketed liquor shops and even stopped trucks transporting liquor. They took part in rallies, walked from village to village explaining the evils of alcoholism. The spontaneity of the women participation in the anti-alcohol movement was best manifested on the stage of Ram Lila where without any hesitation the local women, for the first time in their life, spoke in public about how alcohol had ruined their families. The strength and solidarity displayed by the women was amazing. The autobiography of Sarla Behn mentioned that 25 elderly women were sent to jail for supporting prohibition.
This agitation led to imposition of prohibition in the five districts of Uttarakhand. For the women of Uttarakhand, the success of the movement changed their perception of themselves. They were no more the “beasts of burden”. They began to see themselves as confident human beings with the strength to change policies of the government through organised struggles. Women of the hills had awakened from their slumber and were prepared to fight to safeguard their interests against all challenges.
The initiative of Vimla to spread education and awareness among women had successfully carried forward the mission of Sarla Behn. The victory of the women in the prohibition movement prepared them to participate in the forest rights movement. So, the anti-alcohol movement was the preparatory ground for the mountain village women to take lead roles in the Chipko movement. As women bore responsibilities to sustain families, they were desperate to end addiction and its evil effects. In the case of Chipko the degradation of forests—the source of sustenance of their lives and livelihoods—were threatened. As the basic issues in both the movements were detrimental to the interests of the women, and more importantly to the survival of their families, they joined in large numbers in both the movements.
According to Vimla, Chipko had originally started as a movement based on economic considerations, but later women realised that commercial felling of trees would lead to degradation of the natural environment which would add more hardship to their already hard life. Receding forests meant for the women longer treks along the hazardous mountain slopes for collection of fodder, firewood and water, the basic necessities of daily life. Therefore, the protection of the forests and conservation of the environment for sustenance made the women join Chipko. They agreed to protect trees by clinging to them, if necessary.
Vimla actively participated in both the movements. She rushed to sites whenever she heard loggers’ arrival in the forests. She told us about an incident when she and her companions, who were on vigil at night in a hut, got bolted in by the loggers. All Chipko women, unlettered though they might be, showed exemplary courage in their resistance against felling. They were determined to save their forests even at the cost of their lives.
The agenda which motivated women to join the movement for protection of forests was different from that of men. Forests were sources of sustenance for women whereas they were for the men, sustainable sources of income. Though women and men had different perspectives, they were united in their struggle for protection of forests. Yet, in Chipko, women found autonomous spaces to represent themselves. However, representation of these unlettered village women has either become submerged or appropriated by urban articulate voices.
Sarla Behn and her pupil Vimla Bahuguna who had silently but with committed dedication worked among the village women of remote Uttarakhand region, spreading education and awareness, played a pivotal role in transforming them from “beasts” to self-respecting human beings, conscious participants in social struggles, have not found adequate representation in the literature on women’s struggles in Uttarakhand. It was not until 1992 that finally a detailed interview of Vimla Bahuguna was published.
Sarla Behn and Vimla Bahuguna shared the Gandhian notion that women were not weak and victims waiting to be liberated; their latent moral and spiritual courage needed to be kindled. They awakened the women of Uttarakhand from slumber. They had drawn them out from the corners of their homes to the public arena of agitation politics on the issue of consumption, an issue which women could easily relate to. Their participation against prohibition was therefore, massive and spontaneous. Women fought with courage and determination forcing the state to declare prohibition in five districts. The success of the struggle made the women confident of their potential. The strength of the women was recognised. Vimla Bahuguna felt happy that eventually, the task undertaken by her mentor has yielded its desired result. Still, she believed that “women have to be constantly involved in the struggle for mass awakening” and “women’s groups have to remain active”.
(Debarati Banerjee is associate professor of history, Netaji Subhas Open University, Kolkata. Jayanta Bandyopadhyay is former professor and head, Centre for Development and Environment Policy, Indian Institute of Management, Calcutta)
This was first published in the State of India’s Environment 2025