Curse for the Nature

India witnessed rapid deforestation in the past two decades, leading to the degradation of over 30% of its land and losing 1.6 million hectares of its forest cover. More than a fifth of the country’s population depends on forests for subsistence.

Deforestation and land degradation are projected to impact agricultural productivity, water quality, and biodiversity, thereby affecting over 600 million people in India. According to a TERI study, forest degradation is depriving the country of 1.4% of its GDP annually.

Affirming the success of India’s afforestation program, Javadekar claimed, “India’s green cover has increased by 15,188 sq km in the last four years.” Whereas, the latest ISFR reveals that India’s ‘forest cover has grown by just 0.56% or 3,976 sq km since 2017. ‘Green cover’ is the total tree plus forest cover of a surface and should not be mistaken as equivalent to ‘forests’.

Is the government telling a distorted story of the state of India’s forests?

The government however believes that forests are replaceable and could be easily recreated, allowing rapid diversion of forestland for industrial purposes. A World Resources Institute study found that India has lost 1,22,748 hectares of prime forest within the last four years. Moreover, the MoEFCC has recently proposed to abandon the “no-go” forest area classification, thereby opening up India’s dense, pristine and biodiversity-rich forest zones to development projects.


The real problem lies in how the government defines ‘forest cover. Relying majorly on satellite mapping, the Forest Survey of India defines forests as “all patches of land, with a tree canopy density of more than 10% and more than one hectare in area, irrespective of land use, ownership and species of trees”. Any plantation whether bamboo, coffee, tree orchards, or urban park is hence currently recognized as a forest. Satellite imagery is incapable of detecting differences between plantation and forest. India’s natural dense forests have shrunk at an unprecedented rate.

" To compensate for the loss of ‘forests’, India’s afforestation program focusses on large-scale monoculture, single variety tree plantations of non-indigenous, commercial species such as eucalyptus and teak, on a non-forest land " But is this compensation really worth cutting a massive forest? Let's take a brief report on current projects to understand Govt's "Compensation"!!

The Buxwaha Forest

• In 2019, Essel Mining & Industries Limited (EMIL), an Aditya Birla Group Company, won the Bunder diamond mine project in the Chhatarpur district of Madhya Pradesh. It is estimated that the Bunder diamond block has about 34 million carats of rough diamonds.

• However, the project is facing stiff resistance, including social media campaigns, due to ecological concerns. Australian mining giant Rio Tinto, which had initially explored the project, had faced protests too and exited the project

• Over 200,000 trees are expected to be cut in the Buxwaha forest for the diamond project. Environmentalists fear that the mining project would result in loss of biodiversity as well as air and water pollution.

                                 The Buxwaha forest will be deforested for mining.



The diamond mine project, which is now with Aditya Birla Group’s Essel Mining & Industries Limited (EMIL), is once again facing dark clouds due to protests over ecological concerns, as it could result in the felling of over 200,000 trees!!!


However, the project is facing stiff opposition, including social media campaigns. Already, a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) has been filed in the Supreme Court of India, seeking a stay on the project which had been secured by the EMIL in 2019.

Rio Tinto’s plant and other properties developed for the mining project were handed over to the government.

The Ritual of Deforestation!

This is not the first time that the project is facing resistance. In 2006, the Madhya Pradesh government had granted a prospecting license to Rio Tinto Exploration India Private Limited (RTEIPL), an Australian mining giant, to explore diamond mining in the Buxwaha region in the Chhatarpur district. But the project faced strong opposition over ecological concerns at that time too. Later, the RTEIPL decided not to go ahead with the project and exited the project after submitting a prospecting report to the Madhya Pradesh government in 2017.





Arnab Roy Chowdhury, one of the authors of the study who works with the School of Sociology at the Higher School of Economics (HSE), Moscow said "At the national level as BJP came to power in 2014 and they started leveraging national capitalist houses, at the same time there were issues of channeling rough stones through particular routes to India, which the government was not happy about. So, Rio’s political patronage within India slowly weakened over time and at the same time, the global price of diamonds dwindled. Rio has many of its own diamond mines worldwide, so they thought it is best to get out of this scenario. And then as predicted, an Indian corporate house Aditya Birla Group (Essel Mines) received the lease for Bunder mines,”

Impact on Local Livelihood

The forest is the only primary source of income for the natives of the Buxwaha area. The proposed mine would snatch away their income sources. A large group of locals are indulged in beedi making for their livelihood which is made through the tendu leaves. Deforestation will lead to many people dependent on beedi making loose their only source of livelihood




According to Abhishek Jain, one of the young locals who spoke to TheWire, the Essel group has promised to employ 400 people if the project is cleared, but this employment will only be for skilled workers so locals will not be employed.
Source: https://science.thewire.in/environment/buxwaha-forest-bunder-diamond-mine-suspicion-resistance/

"The Buxwaha region is still considered backward and around 7,000 villagers of 17 tribal villages in the territory depend on the forest products like Mahua, Tendu leaves, Chironji, Amla, etc. The mining will snatch away their income source "

Source: THE QUINT

Protests and Resistance Activity Against The Project

The project is facing resistance due to ecological concerns and also because the locals fear it would lead to loss of livelihood. Despite the claims to provide jobs in mining, the locals feel the project will eat out the livelihood options in the area. Protests against the Buxwaha mining project have been gaining momentum and due to the current COVID-19 situation, a lot of the resistance is online too

The project has run into resistance, including a big social media campaign with hashtags like and #india_stand_with_buxwaha.