Wealth in their Backyards

In the far-flung valleys of Lachen & Lachung in Sikkim and the isolated hamlets of Lahaul & Spiti, women are the primary users of aromatic and dye plants and the main repositories of knowledge on them. Weaving ethnobotany, conservation and women‘s empowerment, Pragya has been helping the tribal women set up Home Gardens (HGs) of aromatic & dye plants in the backyards of their houses. Not only does this ensure the conservation & propagation of these species, it also provides some form of income generation for the local women with the minimum of effort & burden.

High-altitude passive solar greenhouses

Situated slightly over 10,000 ft in the village of Pomrang - close to the Spiti river, is the recently constructed passive solar greenhouse by engineers at Pragya. A similar one at Keylong (Lahaul) is at a little lower altitude. These have been uniquely designed keeping the specifities, needs & climatic conditions of the Cold Deserts in mind. Locally available materials traditionally used in house construction have been used to erect its walls and ensure adequate insulation. These greenhouses trap solar radiation on the south side - on which side the transparent polythene is placed and are furnished with appropriate ventilation to avoid overheating. These are to house the nurseries for raising saplings of medicinal plants native to the region that will be distributed to local medplants growers at no cost. The land for both have been donated by farmers from the community.

Uniting for a noble cause

Unity, as they say, is strength! In the Buddhist societies of the Himalayas, traditional medicine practitioners, better known as amchiis in the lingua franca, enjoy indisputable and universal respect for their medical services to the community which are dispensed without the exchange of money. They also happen to be the storehouses of knowledge on herbs and their healing properties. But even they have been buffetted by the winds of change and Western allopathic medicine, and their system is being threatened. To counter this, the amchiis representing all villages in the Lahaul valley were brought under one umbrella and facilitated towards forming the Lahaul Amchii Society (LAS), along with the active participation and support of the local administration (including the DC of Keylong) and the community. The LAS has been provided assistance by Pragya to set up a demonstrational one-hectare plantation of medplants, in the village of Ghosal, as well as a solar greenhouse for medplant propagation, in Keylong, the district HQ.

‘In the tree lie the roots of all life on earth’

Nothing better, than this statement of the Dalai Lama, encapsulates the importance of trees and forests, on which mountain communities are most dependant for some of their very critical livelihood & survival needs. In the Dirang and Tawang valleys of Arunachal Pradesh that lies in the Biodiversity Hotspot of the Eastern Indian Himalayas, the forest cover has however been dwindling rapidly of late. In the two picturesque villages of Sangti and Shernup in the districts of West Kameng and Tawang respectively, the local communities was encouraged to adopt degraded patches of forest area for afforestation. Saplings of blue pine, oak, cryptomaria japonica species were sourced from the Forest Department and the afforestation was conducted with great fanfare and much fun and picnicking, with active participation of the resident villagers and their school-going children. An upwards of 2,000 saplings were planted along with bamboo-fencing of the trees/area punctutated with community lunch.

Breathing Life into High Altitude Crafts

In October 2002, a week-long training progamme was conducted for the weavers of Lahaul & Spiti in collaboration with Pearl Academy of Fashion, New Delhi. In the spotlight were the handicrafts of lingche (woolen stole), sokten (grass mat) and pherba (blanket made of goat/yak wool) - mostly woven by women. The programme focussed on skill upgradation of the craftsperson, product improvement & diversification and understanding of market trends, and has gone a long way towards resuscitating, and creating a renewed interest in these select crafts of the Lahaul & Spiti region of Himachal.

A New Home for the Himalayan Artefacts

A mosaic of Himalayan artefacts - just a few of them less than centuries old - have found new homes in the Rural Museums set up in Jispa in the Lahaul region and in Kungri of Pin Valley, Spiti. Housing a formidable collection of articles & artefacts unique to the high-altitude Buddhist societies - all donated by the locals - this novel initiative facilitated by Pragya has helped in unearthing and preserving several treasures of the yore. And more than that, this has stimulated a tremendous sense of pride in the local community in its own history and heritage.

A Window for the Lost Crafts

At the newly come-up Culture Promotion Centres (CPCs) in the valleys of Lahaul & Spiti, the entire array of local handicrafts - lingche, sokten, cholu, pherba, chugdu, pula and so much more - are both on display and for sale. Following Pragya's assistance, community members have been ably managing and reaping direct monetary returns from their local products.

Standardising the Syllabus for Bhoti

A mosaic of In the high-altitude villages of the Western Indian Himalayas, Bhoti is the script/language in which all texts are written. This rich language, sadly today, is mostly confined to the lamas and the monasteries. In the valleys of Lahaul & Spiti, Pragya has set up centres for teaching this language to the community - targeting primarily the womenfolk. A few notable centres include the ones at Kungri Gompa premises in Pin valley, Kaza - both in Spiti, Jispa, Darcha and Kollong in the Lahaul region. A three-day training-cum-workshop was conducted by experts of Bhoti for all the teachers at our centres to standardize the course content and method of teaching.

From Flow to Freeze and Back

A mosaic of In the trans-Himalayan cold desert region of Spiti, global warming has been leading to receding glaciers and reducing water for irrigation in the sowing months. To address this, the technique of harvesting snow by creating artificial glaciers in the winter months is being pilot-tested by the Pragya ApTech team for the first time in Spiti valley. In the village of Poh, the water from the upstream nallah is being diverted into a manmade reservoir constructed under the natural shadow of a towering rockface, which would begin freezing with the onset of December. As per estimates, this should thaw at a time when the farmers need the water for irrigation the most.

Eco-Professionals for the Himalayas

In the faraway Himalayan state of Arunachal - one of the biodiversity hotspots of the world - a band of "Eco-Professionals" has been created that would act as the watchdog of its pristine natural environment and cultural wealth. The local stakeholders of tourism - tour operators, hoteliers and mountain guides - of Tawang & West Kameng - the only districts to have been opened up for tourists, were imparted specialised training towards appropriate visitor & destination management and provided exposure to the concept of eco-tourism - before it gets too late.

Grassroots Institutions for Heritage Preservation

Pragya has facilitated the local community to set up formalised institutional structures at the village level for managing heritage preservation on professional lines. Heritage Conservation Council(s) {HCC} comprising officebearers and members from lay members of the community have been registered with the District Administration in various bio-cultural zones of Lahaul & Spiti. HCCs have been playing a pivotal role in the functioning of the Rural Museums and Culture Promotion Centres established.

Toarchbearers for Renewable Energy

Nowhere else than in the Himalayas has the need for renewable energy been so critical. Pragya has mooted the idea of constituting a grassroots group of technically minded young men and women for spreading the awareness and use of appropriate environmental technologies. Liaising with experts on solar, wind and water energy, the feasibility of various appropriate technology options in the state of Arunachal, are being explored. Appropriate disposal & management of waste and the possibility of generating energy from these are being explored as well. An orientation workshop has been carried out on the potential technologies, and several more are in the offing.

Leaving out none for the DDP Workshop

A mosaic of Towards the assessment and recasting of the Desert Development Programme (DDP) of the Government of India, being implemented in the cold desert regions of the country, Pragya conducted a first-of-its-kind workshop in New Delhi in May 2002. Never before in the history of the scheme had there been a vertical integration of all the agencies in the DDP channel, working together on designing an appropriate development model for cold deserts. It included Secretary-level participants from the Central Government, State government, district administration, DDA agency, expert organisations, local area experts and best practice presenters from the community.

Counting Tigers at Namdapha in Arunachal

In between, we found time to participate in the Tiger Census excercise at the Namdapha National Park, a Project Tiger Reserve in Changlang District of Arunachal! Two volunteers represented the organisation for the week-long excercise which involved trekking deep into its dense jungles and wading through the waist-deep waters of the Noha Dihing river for spotting the pugmarks of this elusive member of the cat family.