Where communities plant trees

Every day, without fail, a group of four women takes the responsibility to walk and to ensure that nobody fells trees there. They fight with intruders; they confiscate their axes and bicycles

“Why do you patrol the forest near your village every day and have been doing so for the past 30 years? Why does it matter so much?” I ask a group of women, who look at me with amazement for posing the question.

I am in Kodalpali, a village in Nayagarh district of Odisha, and can see dense, verdant forests for miles. The village is remote and would be classified as poor on economic criteria. It has rudimentary toilets and no piped water supply, and the only school has been closed because of a bizarre policy of “rationisation”, which means that