Hamare Van, Hamare Gaon (Our Forests, Our Villages)

The Corbett Foundation (TCF) has been working in Bandhavgarh-Sanjay Dubri Corridor (BSDC), an important forested landscape that connects Bandhavgarh and Sanjay tiger reserves in Madhya Pradesh. Despite being an important connecting corridor of these tiger reserves, awareness about tiger and overall biodiversity conservation in quite low among the villages of BSDC. Community dependence on the forest in BSDC for cattle grazing, firewood collection and collection of minor forest products is very high. There have also been cases of tiger deaths from BSDC in the past raising suspicions about poaching. All this has a direct link to a lack of awareness about the need to conserve the forests and wildlife among the local communities.

Unless the level awareness is raised, it is difficult to expect success in conservation and protection of flora-fauna. Therefore, TCF felt a pressing need to spread environmental awareness among the student community to make them realize the seriousness of the issues at hand. 

To bridge this gap, TCF has published a 116-page pictorial booklet titled Hamare Van, Hamare Gaon providing an overall insight about the local biodiversity of BSDC, its ecological values and the need for its conservation. The language of this first-of-its-kind publication purposefully has been kept as hindi so that the contents of the publication and the important conservation message therein reaches to as many schools in BSDC and in Bandhavgarh and Sanjay-Dubri tiger reserves.

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This publication will be given free of cost to schools to ensure maximum readability. TCF hopes that this booklet helps in raising the much-needed awareness among the local communities and they support conservation efforts. TCF will also inculcate this booklet in its regular awareness programmes not only among the BSDC landscape but also in other areas of the central Indian landscape.

This booklet has received appreciation of the Director, Rajya Shiksha Kendra (School Education Department), Bhopal by way of a message appealing school principals to use this booklet.
TCF is grateful to Jet Privilege Pvt. Ltd. for supporting Preserving What's Precious project in BSDC under which this publication was produced.