Widowed as a teenager and without steady schooling, Basanti Samant rose to become a resilient leader in Kumaon's Kausani village – bringing together women to save the Kosi, conserve forests and counter abuse.Her hair is worked hard upon – neatly oiled and plaited. Abundant wrinkles crisscross her face. She is wearing hawai chappals and a khadi saree that falls slightly above her ankles. She looks ready for a day of work, but is here to take us across the Pinnath range to the Rudradhari waterfall – the source of the Kosi river in the Kumaon region.
We are participants at an annual March-April community festival in Kausani, a village of around 2,400 people on the border of Bageshwar and Almora districts of Uttarakhand. Basanti Samant, 60, or Basanti behen, as she is widely addressed, is a speaker at the event. She is not randomly picked to lead our pack.
Some years ago, she led a movement – forming 200 groups, each with 15-20 women – in and around Kausani , to save the Kosi. By 2002, the river's summer flow had dwindled to around 80 litres a second from 800 litres in 1992, and since then Samant and the women of Kausani have worked hard for its conservation.
Back in 2002, Samant inspired women to stop cutting live wood and start planting more native broadleaf trees such as the banj oak. The women pledged to use water judiciously, and to put out and prevent forest fires. Samant ushered them into a sisterhood that conserves the environment, but over the years, the women have stayed together, deriving strength from each other for battles also fought within their homes.
But, at first, Samant had to fight her own battle.
"My life was like the mountain – difficult and uphill," she says. When she was around 12 and had completed Class 5, Basanti was married. She moved to her husband's home in Tharkot village of Pithoragarh district. By the time she turned 15, her husband, a school teacher, died. "My mother-in-law would tell me that I ate him," she says.
she packed her few clothes and returned home to Digara, her village in Pithoragarh, to help her mother and aunts cut grass and collect cow dung.
A few years later, Basanti heard about Lakshmi Ashram, a training centre for young women in Kasauni, started in 1946 by Catherine Heilman, a disciple of Mahatma Gandhi. Basanti sent a letter to the ashram asking for admission. "Radha Bhatt, the president, asked me to come," she says. Her father dropped her to the ashram for a year-long sewing programme in 1980.
But, at first, Samant had to fight her own battle.
"My life was like the mountain – difficult and uphill," she says. When she was around 12 and had completed Class 5, Basanti was married. She moved to her husband's home in Tharkot village of Pithoragarh district. By the time she turned 15, her husband, a school teacher, died. "My mother-in-law would tell me that I ate him," she says.
she packed her few clothes and returned home to Digara, her village in Pithoragarh, to help her mother and aunts cut grass and collect cow dung.
A few years later, Basanti heard about Lakshmi Ashram, a training centre for young women in Kasauni, started in 1946 by Catherine Heilman, a disciple of Mahatma Gandhi. Basanti sent a letter to the ashram asking for admission. "Radha Bhatt, the president, asked me to come," she says. Her father dropped her to the ashram for a year-long sewing programme in 1980.
In 2003, Samant read an article in Amar Ujala saying that the Kosi will die in 10 years if deforestation and forest fires were not controlled – and she propelled into action.
The conversation struck a chord. Around 2003, the women formed a committee, appointed a president, and the cutting of trees gradually stopped in the village. The men in Kausani too began to support the movement. The women still left their house early but this time, to gather drywood. The villagers entered into an agreement with the forest department – the department would recognise they had the first right over wood, but neither the officials nor the villagers would cut trees. It set a strong precedent and committees of women were formed in several nearby villages.
The conversation struck a chord. Around 2003, the women formed a committee, appointed a president, and the cutting of trees gradually stopped in the village. The men in Kausani too began to support the movement. The women still left their house early but this time, to gather drywood. The villagers entered into an agreement with the forest department – the department would recognise they had the first right over wood, but neither the officials nor the villagers would cut trees. It set a strong precedent and committees of women were formed in several nearby villages.
In 2016, Samant was awarded the Nari Shakti Puraskar by the Ministry of Women and Child Development – she proudly received it from former President Pranab Mukherjee.
source & credit :https://ruralindiaonline.org/