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A number of villagers are beginning to see the critical relevance of our efforts at protecting the forest, and supplementing with additional, useful tree species/crops. Most other ‘forest areas’ are steadily disappearing. Traditional rice farming too is now fraught with risks because of erratic rainfall – too much or too little falling at the wrong time. Their ‘educated’ children are unable to find jobs, and unwilling/ unable to wield the plough. A litany of woes has begun to surface. Part of the answer to local economic problems perhaps lies in integrating horticulture with forest protection, and supplementing with decentralized village industries. Of course, this is the old ‘Gandhian prescription’. But then, our basic human needs are also age-old.

As Bhaskarbhai pointed out during his last visit in 2004, “The land I see here is excellent, and ideally suited for horticulture. If you protect the planted areas (from cattle), and put in place a conservative irrigation delivery system, there are lots of fruit species and other horticultural crops you can successfully grow.

“By simultaneously inter-planting in the same area, short lifespan, medium lifespan and long lifespan species, so as to rapidly cover the entire land with vegetation, you can multiply the benefit of the irrigation provided, minimize evaporation losses, and also start obtaining yield from the very first year – from the short lifespan species like vegetables. Eleven months from planting, the papayas and bananas should start fruiting, and continue to yield for a few years. By then, other medium lifespan species (like custard apple) would be fruiting well. A little later, your long lifespan trees like mango would also begin to yield.”

Community Learning Alliance’ and Long-term Vision
In October this year, Van Vadi will be hosting a 6 day ‘skill-share’ Van Utsav (or Forest Festival) around the theme, ‘Sharing Creativity, Celebrating Community’. This, we hope, will attract a number of ‘like-minded’ sensitive souls to give a fillip to our effort at building an alternative community. As an immediate goal though, we plan to start an ongoing ‘Community Learning Alliance’ that includes both adivasi youngsters, as well as city folk. What actually unfolds, remains to be seen…

Post-script: About 60 people, including a number of kids and 3 grandparents participated in the Van-utsav. Most stayed the full 6 days – without electricity or piped water, and had a great time! The ‘forest festival’ concept caught on, and was hosted in 2006 by Sadhana Forest, Auroville. In 2007, it will hopefully return to Van Vadi. While Van Vadi still does not have any resident community on the land, apart from our 5 adivasi workers, we are hopeful that it will happen when the time is ripe. Meanwhile, the paving of the road going past our land has improved vehicular accessibility. Electricity is expected to reach in a year or two, though not all are happy about that!

[Note: Van Vadi is about 1.5 km from village Vaara (Vare), Taluka Karjat (closer to Neral), District Raigarh, Maharashtra.]

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