Resumo de Sacred Biodiversity - Yogesh Gokhale,Ashish Kothari

Sacred biodiversity

Indian society is an unbelievable mixture of different cultures and traditions. Each society has its own life style. Many of these societies or cultures have traditionally developed strategies of conserving and managing nature and the natural resources. These strategies were highly congruent to the traditional lifestyle of the respective societies. The Sacred conservation practices followed by local people have come into focus of late due to their importance for protecting several delicate ecosystems and threatened species, the explicit connections they show between cultural and biological diversity, and their potential of people oriented conservation efforts.
Sacred species
            The plant and animal species have been traditionally protected, and continued to be conserved in many parts of India. These could be totemic species, a practice in which tribal all over the world consider specific plants or animals or even rivers and mountains as their ancestors
            Examples like, tigers by the Mushahari clan of the Bodo tribe in Assam, and Diospyros melanoxylon (Tendu tree) by theGonds of Gadchirohi district in Maharashtra. Hindu mythology prescribesVratas i.e.ritual performances for respective deities like Ganapathy Vrata, Lakshmi Vrata and nitya somawara Vrata. These vratas need to be performed by using specific plant species. The Krnataka Forest Department describes 19 vratas and more than 100 plant species required for these.
Sacred landscapes
            Forest, mountain peaks and hillocks, rivers and steam beds, ponds and grasslands are left aside or their use strictly regulated, due to faith or fear associated with the deity.
The most well-known and celebrated are sacred grooves, patches of natural or near-natural vegetation, dedicated by local communities to their ancestral spirits or deities. Sacred grooves are identified in different parts of India: Kavu in Kerala, Devarabana, Devarakadu, Naybanain Karnataka. Koil kadu in Tamil Nadu, Devarai in MAharashtra Deovan in western India and Himalayan states. There are others sacred landscapes too that have had an equally important life in the culture of communities. Sacred grazing pastures, often a sparse woodland or predominantly grass land ecosystem, are in Western Rajasthan. They are locally called Oran. In the villages of several Himalayan states, especially Uttaranchal and Himachal Pradesh, high altitude meadows are important grazingresource. In Uttaranchal these meadows are called bugyal, and in Himachal rang. In bugyals people graze sheep only after worshipping the local deity, usually during July-August. Similar practices are also found in Himachal Pradesh where the festival is called sonechang.
            Last but not the least, there are the sacred waterbodies. Parts of steams and riverbeds called machhiyal in Himachal Pradesh and Uttaranchal are The future of the sacred
            The sacred species and landscape in India have taken a beating in the last few decades, and perhaps only fraction of them survive of their original extent. Cultural traditions have erodedunder the influence of adivasi cultures, the younger gerneration is not as apiritually inclined as their elders, govermantal takeover of common lands has weakened community controls, and commercial considerations have undermined cultural and ecological ones. Yet, there may be 1,00,000 to 1,50,000 sacred groves and ecosysems spread across India, and they contain critical populations of some threatened species, provide important refuge to biodiversity that has been driven out of the surrounding landscapes. Most importanat, they provide a continued reminder that human cultures and biodiversity have evolved together, and that encouragement of such a link is likely to be a key element in an ecologically and socially secure future.

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