forest society

Introduction

Forests also provide bamboo, wood for fuel, grass, charcoal, packaging, fruits, flowers, animals, birds and many other things Between 1700 and 1995,the period of industrialization, 13.9 million sq km of forest or 9.3 per cent of the worlds total area was cleared for industrial uses, cultivation, pastures and fuel wood.

Why Deforestation?

Land to be Improved

First the British directly encouraged the production of commercial crops like jute, sugar, wheat and cotton.

Second, in the early nineteenth century, the colonial state thought that forests were unproductive. They were considered to be brought under cultivation so that

the land could yield agricultural products and revenue, and enhance the income of the state. between 1880 and 1920, cultivated area rose by 6.7 million hectares.

Sleepers on the Tracks.

The spread of railways from the 1850s created demands To run locomotives, wood was needed as fuel, and To lay railway lines sleepers were essential to hold the tracks together. each mile of railway track required between 1,760 and 2,000 sleepers.

By 1890, about 25,500 km of track had been laid. In 1946, the length of the

tracks had increased to over 765,000 km. in the Madras Presidency alone, 35,000 tree were being cut annually for sleepers.

Plantations  

Large areas of natural forests were also given to European planters at cheap rates  cleared to make way for

tea, coffee and rubber plantations to meet Europeís growing need

for these commodities.

The Rise of Commercial Forestry.

British decided to invite a German

expert, Dietrich Brandis, for advice, and made him the first Inspector

General of Forests in India.

Brandis set up the Indian Forest Service in 1864 and

helped formulate the Indian Forest Act of 1865. The Imperial Forest

Research Institute was set up at Dehradun in 1906. The system they

taught here was called scientific forestry.

What is plantation or scientific forestry?

In scientific forestry, natural forests of different types

of trees were cut down. In their place, one type of tree was planted

in straight rows. This is called a plantation.

Describe the Indian Forest Act of 1865.

Ans the Forest Act was enacted in 1865.

 it was amended twice, once in 1878 and then in 1927. The 1878 Act divided forests into

three categories: reserved, protected and village forests. The best

forests were called reserved forests. Villagers could not take anything

from these forests, even for their own use. For house building or

fuel, they could take wood from protected or village forests.

 Q How are forests are useful for people?

 In forest areas, people use forest products ñ roots, leaves, fruits, and

Tubers for many things.  Fruits and tubers are nutritious to eat, Herbs

are used for medicine, wood for agricultural implements like yokes

and ploughs, bamboo makes excellent fences and is also used to make

baskets and umbrellas.

A dried scooped-out gourd can be used as a portable water bottle. Almost everything is available in the forest leaves can be stitched together to make disposable plates and cups,

  creeper can be used to make ropes, and the thorny bark of the  semur

(silk-cotton) tree is used to grate vegetables.

Oil for cooking and to light lamps can be pressed from the fruit of the  Mahua tree.

How were the Lives of People Affected?

After the Act, all their everyday practices ñ cutting wood for their  

houses, grazing their cattle, collecting fruits and roots, hunting and

fishing became illegal.

People were now forced to steal wood

from the forests, and if they were caught, they were at the mercy of

the forest guards who would take bribes from them.

Women who collected fuel wood were especially worried.

It was also common for

police constables and forest guards to harass people by demanding

free food from them.

How did Forest Rules Affect Cultivation?

 . European foresters regarded this practice as harmful for the forests. The government decided to ban shifting cultivation.  As a result, many communities were forcibly displaced from their homes in the forests. Some had to change occupations, while some

resisted through large and small rebellions.

Q What are local names of shifting cultivation in world?

It has many local names such as ladingin Southeast Asia, milpa in CentralAmerica, chitemene or tavy in Africa,and chena in Sri Lanka.

 In India, dhya, penda, bewar, nevad, jhum, podu, khandad and kumri are some of the local terms for swidden agriculture.

Who could Hunt?

Hunting was prohibited by the forest laws.

Those who were caught hunting were now punished for poaching.

The British saw large animals as signs of a wild, primitive and savage

Society. They believed that by killing dangerous animals the British  

would civilise India. They gave rewards for the killing of tigers, wolves

and other large animals on the grounds that they posed a threat to

cultivators. 0ver 80,000 tigers, 150,000 leopards and 200,000 wolves

were killed for reward in the period 1875-1925.

The Maharaja of Sarguja alone

shot 1,157 tigers and 2,000 leopards up to 1957.

 A British administrator, George Yule, killed 400 tigers.

New Trades, New Employments and New Services.

Many communities left their traditional occupations and started trading in forest products.

From the medieval period onwards, we have records of adivasi communities trading

elephants and other goods like hides, horns, silk cocoons, ivory, bamboo, spices, fibres, grasses, gums and resins through nomadic communities like the Banjaras

In Assam, both men and women from forest communities like Santhals and Oraons from Jharkhand, and Gonds from Chhattisgarh were recruited to work on tea

plantations.

Q Which tribes were known as criminal tribes?

Korava, Karachi and Yerukula of the Madras

Presidency lost their livelihoods. Some of them began to be called

criminal tribes.

Q What was devsari, dand or man?

If people from a village want to take some

wood from the forests of another village, they pay a small fee called devsari, dand or man in exchange.

A number of different communities live in Bastar such as Maria and Muria Gonds, Dhurwas, Bhatras and Halbas. They speak different languages but share common customs and beliefs.

Forest villages

Some villages were allowed to stay on in the reserved forests on the condition

that they worked free for the forest department in cutting and

Transporting trees, and protecting the forest from fires. Subsequently,

these came to be known as forest villages.