As the world celebrates yet another Environment Day, groups of marginalized people in some part of the globe or the other get evicted from their traditional land and livelihood. They are pushed to the brink of tragedy in the name of conservation so that animals can survive. Why does it have to be so? Man vs animal or, man vs nature. People have to be placed at the centre if conservation has to make sense universally. What makes things even worse, is that these so-called protected zones allow commercial activities to go almost unchecked. On the eve of World Environment Day, ravleen kaur comes face to face with the twin predicament of the marginalized in the salt pans of Gujarat protecting the endangered wild ass has become a ruse to evict Agaria salt-makers. At the same time, the state government has looked askance at pollution by units of two major industrial groups which threatens local livelihoods