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S. Gopikrishna Warrier

Hills and forests continue to remain coloured patches on maps hanging in Central and State ministries despite their rich yields. With the UN declaring 2002 "International Year of the Mountains," it's time to focus on development and conservation of hill regions.

As old as the hills," is an age-old expression. For any society that respects its senior citizens there should be a respect for the hills and mountains. This, however, is far from the truth in most places around the world.

To draw attention to the concept of sustainable mountain development, this year has been declared as the "International Year of the Mountains" (IYM) by the United Nations. Ten years after the Rio Summit, the IYM is expected to build on the processes initiated in Chapter 13 of Agenda 21, which talks of action to achieve sustainable mountain development.

The IYM home page states that the aim of the year is to ensure the well being of mountain and lowland communities by promoting the conservation and sustainable development of mountain regions.

It is estimated that about 10 per cent of the world's population depends directly on mountain resources, and a much larger percentage draws on the resources indirectly. This is especially true in India, where there would not be a single State that does not have a hill or mountain range running through it.

In fact there may not be any other country whose ranges support the diversity of ecosystems that the Indian mountains support. The Himalayas itself supports tropical evergreen forests, cold deserts, the Ladakh moonscape and the Alpine meadows. The shola-grassland ecosystem of the Western Ghats, on the other hand, ensures that the rivers of the peninsula get their water supply throughout the year.

The Himalayas and the southern Western Ghats support two of the world's biodiversity hotspots — in the hills of the North East, and Agasthyamalai hills near the tip of the peninsula.

If not for the Aravallis, running diagonally through Rajasthan, and ending in The Ridge inside Delhi city, the eastern edge of the Thar desert may not have been where it is now. Though eroded over millennia, these hill ranges provide the impounding wall for the desert sands.

During the four consecutive years of drought in Rajasthan between 1984 and 1988, many developmental agencies realised that the Aravallis had become almost totally bereft of tree cover, and hence was more vulnerable to erosion. This realisation started off a movement to carry out watershed development activities in the hills, which perhaps could be considered a precursor to the large-scale watershed development projects that are being initiated by the Central and the State Governments.

The rounded Satpuras, or the saw-tooth shaped Vindhyas, not only provide the catchment for the Narmada river, but were also home to the earliest human habitations in the country. The hills of the Chotanagpur plateau and Bastar, with their moist deciduous habitat rich in sal and mahua trees, are home to many tribal communities. The non-timber forest produce from these hills — tendu leaves, mahua flowers, broomstick, etc. — supports the livelihoods of these communities.

When John Sullivan, the intrepid British Collector of Coimbatore, trekked up to the upper plateau of the Nilgiri hills in 1822, he found a land whose clime was similar to his country. These hills, and the Anamalai hills across the Palghat Gap, rise to such a height that on the upper reaches they become temperate islands in tropical latitudes. Ever since Sullivan's discovery, this feature of these hills has been used to grow crops which otherwise would not have grown in the plains.

A change of mind

If the ecological services provided by the hills are so substantial, why then are they always in the background of the national consciousness? The answer in this case, perhaps, is similar to what the World Commission on Forests concluded about the world's forests. After all, forests and hills literally go hand-in-glove. The Commission had felt that unless the value of the ecological services was converted into economic terms, it is very difficult for the policy-maker to appreciate it.

Ecological historians decry the colonial forest policy of seeing forests merely as timber resources. Not much change has taken place in the political attitude even after more than half a century of Independence.

Hills and forests have continued to remain different coloured patches on the maps hanging in the Central and State ministries from where a steady stream of resources and commodities can be expected to flow to business centres and factories in the plains.

This could be mineral and metal ores from the Chotanagpur plateau or the Kudremukh hills; rubber and cardamom from the hills in Kerala; tea and pulpwood from Nilgiris and Anamalais, etc.

The development needs of the communities that live in these hills, whose sacrifice makes these resources available, are very easily forgotten. Some of the indigenous communities in the high biodiversity regions themselves live in abject poverty.

The alienation of these communities gets compounded with poor investment in infrastructure. Roads into some parts of the Himalayas were planned for troop movement after the Chinese incursion. This is like putting the cart before the horse — the roads should have been there because there were communities living there.

Small drinking water projects planned for some villages close to Tehri town were shelved so that the resources could be used for the Tehri hydel project. The water from the reservoir, after running the turbines, would be used for irrigation and urban supply in the plains.

In recent decades, the political fall-out of this neglect has been surfacing. Almost all the separatist movements that surfaced (except for Punjab) in the 1980s have been from the hilly regions. All of the three new States — Uttaranchal, Jharkhand and Chattisgarh — have been formed due to pressure from the local hill communities for a separate political identity.

Earmarking a year for a particular purpose is meant to draw attention to it. The IYM can be used as a good opportunity to take a serious look at the developmental needs in the hills, so that hill communities themselves protect the natural resources.

Pictures: (Above) The lush Nilgiri Valley is also used for cultivation (picture by Sarvesh);

(left) the Kudremukh hills, rich in minerals and metal ores (picture by V.K. Varadarajan).

Feedback may be sent to warrier@thehindu.co.in

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