Shreya Pareek
Almost three
decades ago, a teenager, after noticing the deaths of a large number of
reptiles due to a lack of a tree cover, started planting Bamboo in an area that
had been washed away by floods. Today, that same land hosts 1,360 acres of
Jungle called Molai Forest, named after Jadav “Molai” Payeng, the man who made
this possible single handedly!
That
forest is now home to Bengal tigers, Indian rhinoceros, over 100 deer and
rabbits besides apes and several varieties of birds, including a large number
of vultures. There are several thousand trees. Bamboo covers an area of over
300 hectares. A herd of around 100 elephants regularly visits the forest every
year and generally stays for around six months. They have given birth to 10
calves in the forest in recent years. (Source)
Picture courtesy- Bijit Dutta (Wikimedia Commons)
“The
education system should be like this, every kid should be asked to plant two
trees,” Payeng says.
He was 16
when the flood hit Assam, and Payeng observed that the flow of migratory birds
was gradually declining to the forest areas and wetlands near his home and
snakes were disappearing in large numbers. This disturbed him.
“I asked
my elders, what would they do if all of us die one day, like these snakes. They
just laughed and smirked but I knew I had to make the planet greener,” he says.
His
village elders told him that with decline in forest cover and deforestation,
animals lost their homes. The solution was to build new homes or forests for
the animals, they said. (Source)
He alerted
the forest department but they asked him to plant trees himself (which he
actually did). He located a riverine island, on the banks of River Brahmaputra,
and began to plant the saplings. Payeng visited the island and planted a few
saplings every day for three decades.
Watering
the growing area of plants posed a problem. He could not draw water from the
river and water all the growing plants, as the area proved to be vast for one
man.
He built a
bamboo platform on the top of each sapling and placed earthen pots with small
holes in them. The water would gradually drip on the plants below and water
them through the week until the pots were drained of water. (Source)
Next year,
in 1980, he started working with the social forestry division of Golaghat
district when they launched a scheme of tree plantation on 200 hectares at
Aruna Chapori situated at a distance of 5 km from Kokilamukh in Jorhat
district.
Payeng was
one of the labourers who worked in that 5-year-long project. He chose to stay
back after the completion of the project even after other workers left. He
looked after the plants and continued to plant more trees on his own, in an
effort to transform the area into a forest.
Payeng
belongs to a tribe called “Mishing” in Assam, India. He lives in a small hut in
the forest with his wife, and his 3 children. He has cattle and buffalo on his
farm and sells the milk for his livelihood, which is his only source of income.
“My
friends have become engineers and are living in the city. I have sacrificed
everything and this Jungle is my home now. The recognition and awards that I
have received is my wealth and that makes me the happiest man in the world,”
Payeng says.
Payeng was
honoured at a public function arranged by the School of Environmental Sciences,
Jawaharlal Nehru University on 22nd April, 2012 for his remarkable achievement.
JNU
vice-chancellor Sudhir Kumar Sopory
named Jadav Payeng as “Forest Man of India”. In the month of October
2013, he was honoured at the Indian Institute of Forest Management during their
annual event ‘Coalescence’. (Source)
Isn’t it
amazing to see the willpower of this man who fought alone and won the battle
single-handedly? Where we don’t hesitate to cut trees for our luxuries, he has
sacrificed all the worldly pleasures to save the environment and the
eco-system. The country needs more such superheroes who are trying to make the
Earth a better place to live for one and all.
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