Aadi and his varied food items from a single farm
The forest hymn The daily life of the Kondhs explains what makes tribals fight for forests
Manu Moudgil
L
oknath Nauri comes home with a large herd of cattle. He had taken them out for grazing in the forest. But surprisingly they are not milch cows. “Only one of these gives milk and that too is mostly consumed by the
46 GovernanceNow | May 1-15, 2016
calf,” says Nauri in a genteel voice. A middle-aged man with salt and pepper hair and a pencil moustache to match, Nauri knows there’s more to this herd than milk. Besides being collateral for hard times, it is kept for the dung which is used in the fields as a natural fertiliser. “We would not have been able to keep the herd if the forest was not there,” says Nauri. We are at Korandiguda village in Odisha. The village is looked over by the Niyamgiri hills, made famous by the Kondhs who sent packing the bauxite mining project of London-listed
Vedanta Resources in 2013. Nauri also belongs to the Kondh tribe but unlike those on Niyamgiri who indulge in hunting, his forefathers learnt to work up the earth by ploughing, irrigating, removing weeds and mulching. But their connection with forests is very much intact. In fact, a lot of their food of daily consumption still comes from the jungle. From March to June, when the crop cycle ends, the villagers are totally dependent on uncultivated food.
The forest basket
At Kondhavguda village, most people are out in the forest to pick wild food