Prasanna K. Samal

G.B. Pant Institute of Himalayan Environment & Development · North East Unit

The Himalaya is the youngest mountain chain on the planet and is believed to be still evolving, and thereby, is not having stabilized from geological and geomorphological considerations. The Indian Himalaya; with a breadth of 250-300 km and stretch of over 2500 km from Jammu and Kashmir in the west to Arunachal Pradesh in the east; covers an area o...

Arunachal Pradesh, the land of rising sun, has abundance of natural and biological resources. It is the largest mountain state in North-East India, covering a geographical area of 83,743 km2 which constitutes 2.54 % of the total area of the country, 15.76% of the Indian Himalayan Region and 43.62% of the Himalayan Biodiversity Hot Spot. The state i...

The Eastern Himalayan region contains more than one-third of India’s biodiversity and represents the Indo-Burma global biodiversity hotspot. The region has been characterized by large rural population, low population density, large percentage of indigenous tribal communities and large area under forests. It is home to over 200 tribal communities, s...

The paper in an attempt to develop an inventory of faunal diversity of Dibru-Saikhwa Biosphere Reserve (DSBR) of Assam which is one of the important Biosphere Reserves of the Eastern Indian Himalaya and to highlight the threats that the BR is facing over the years so as to decisively support the need for conservation efforts. After compilation and...

This article presents an overview of climate change impacts on agriculture, water and forest ecosystems in the western Himalayan mountains based on literature review and some anecdotal evidences. A great deal of research work has been carried out on different aspects of western Himalayan mountain ecosystems but the findings have yet to be correlate...

Traditional remedies used for treating diabetic ailments are very important in the primary health care of the people living in rural Dhemaji district of Assam, north-east India. Novel information gathered from the current survey is important in preserving folk indigenous knowledge. Interviews were conducted amongst 80 households comprising of 240 i...

Along with the Greater Himalaya, in the eastern Himalayan region there has been increased efforts to bring more areas under the Protected Area Network. Protected areas including conservation areas in Arunachal Pradesh are mostly located in the low and mid-elevation forest areas. To address the need of having a protected area in the higher altitudes...

This paper attempts to document NTFPs diversity in the shifting agriculture fallow land of Adi tribe in Siang districts in Arunachal Pradesh. A total of 62 species belonging to 57 genera and 38 families were recorded, which have significant role in livelihood sustenance of Adi community. Among all the NTFP species, angiosperms contributed highest n...

Indigenous medicine is an important component of indigenous knowledge system, which is widely practiced by tribal communities across India. The paper, based on an empirical investigation, describes the relevance of indigenous medicine and healthcare practices prevalent among the Bhotia tribe in Indian Central Himalaya, in terms of their contributio...

Shifting cultivation is a predominant practice in the majority of tropical hilly tracts. Relatively few studies have examined forest recovery following shifting cultivation and we have reviewed these studies to identify and synthesize general recovery patterns. Most studies report that, although pioneer tree species recover relatively faster, woody...

Arunachal Himalaya is the part of Eastern Himalaya with high ethnic and cultural diversity. It shares 2.5% of the total geographical area of the country, 15.76% of Indian Himalayan region and 43.62% of the Biological Hotspot, Eastern Himalaya. Apatani is one of the major ethnic tribal groups of Arunachal Himalaya inhabiting eco-culturally valued zo...

Agriculture in the Indian Central Himalaya as an integrated resource system, being mainly dependent on forests and livestock, is also absolutely dependent on the input of women. The article shows that women have greater access to the major primary productive resources in the region and shoulder the responsibility of rationally managing and conservi...

A fundamental concern of the world today is better ecosystem services and sustainable development. Forest cover can help in efficient ecological process and sustainable utilization of forest base can play a vital role in preventing desertification. A number of regional, national, and international legislations have emerged to protect deforestation...

In the Indian Central Himalaya, agriculture is the major source of livelihood for native societies as well as being a fundamental component of natural resource management. However, the system is traditional in nature, based on largely rainfed agriculture, which is dependent upon indigenous technologies and inputs for its continuity. Soil fertility...

In the Indian Central Himalaya, indigenous knowledge is an important natural resource that has enormous potential to facilitate the development process in cost-effective and sustainable ways. It governs almost all important productive resource sectors and revolves around traditional values of resource use. In this study, covering nineteen settlemen...

The mountains hold the key to global ecological and social stability by virtue of being centres of biological and cultural diversity and the storehouse for water and other resources. However, they are becoming unable to sustain the demands of the changing life style of the growing number of inhabitants as well as the population in the plains and, t...

The people inhabiting the mountains of the Central Himalayan region of India are heavily dependent on their immediate natural resources for their survival. However, this resource-poor mountain ecosystem is gradually becoming unable to provide a minimum standard of living to its continually growing population. In this ecosystem, human population is...

The Indian Himalayan Region (IHR) is suffering from environmental degradation due to population pressure and infra-structural needs. This is coupled with a natural setting, which creates problems of accelerated soil erosion and mass wasting. In view of these environmental difficulties and the growing concern for effective restoration, there has bec...

The Indian Central Himglaya(ICH) is one of the richest ecozones, culturally as well as biologically. The people inhabiting this region like elsewhere in Indian Republic have undergone a number of initiatives and interventions that aim at combating their poverty and improving their economic condition. However, empirical investigations carried out re...

In mountain ecosystems like those of the Central Himalayan region of India, local people are dependent on their immediate bioresources for their survival. For their own well-being, as well as for that of their life-support systems like livestock, the mountain people, based on their generations of experience, have evolved indigenous health care prac...

The Indian Himalaya, rich with diverse ethnic communities and their cultural heritage, is the home for 171 tribal communities out of a total 573 tribal communities in India. As many as five tribal communities reside in the Central Himalayan region of India. These communities are unique in their culture, resource use pattern and in their relation wi...

The Rajis or Van-Rajis or Van-Rawats, socially and economically, are the most underdeveloped tribal community of Central Himalayan region of India. They are a primitive and numerically very small tribal community. Other than being primitive and forest dweller, the tribe is nomadic which prevented a complete and true enumeration of its population, a...

The Indian republic contains a large number of tribal communities with varied cultures. Efforts to develop these communities by the government of India and the provincial governments continue to be important in the post-independence planning era, and perceptible development has occurred in the socioeconomic and demographic areas. However, expected...

The article is based on the findings of a study on the functioning of the village Khatuwa, located in the Jaunsar-Bawar region of Central Himalayan region of India. The village is inhabited by the Jaunsaries, a scheduled tribe and have been so since 1967, when the area Jaunsar-Bawar, where they reside, was declared scheduled area. They are polyandr...

This article discusses about influences of culture on resource use and management for sustainable living with the help of polyandry, a unique cultural practice found among the Jaunsaries, a tribal community in Central Himalayan region of India. The Jaunsaries, a scheduled tribe, inhabit in Jaunsar Bawar region of Dehradun district of state of Uttar...

Polyandry constitutes a specific cultural pattern in the Himalayan region and especially in Jaunsar Bawar locality it becomes the peoples characteristic feature in day-to-day life and philosophy. But during the recent period due to the implementation of various developmental activities the traditional culture centering round polyandry is in a rapid...

Polyandry as a social institution has often been connoted as a cultural oddity or an ethnographic fossil in the evolution of family. In part, this view has resulted from a fragmented or isolated analytical frame work. This article, in contrast, takes a more holistic point of view to express the institution in its ecological, economic and cultural p...

ENVIS Newsletter on Himala yan Ecolog y is an annual non-priced publication of the ENVIS Centre, which was established at the headquarters of the G.B. Pant Institute of Himalayan Environment and Development (GBPIHED) in the financial year 1992-93 with the fiscal support from the Ministry of Environment and Forests, Go vernment of India, New Delhi....

The tribal population which constitute about 8.01% of the total population and signify the cultural diversity of Indian Republic, have experienced various efforts by the State after independence to improve their socio-economic condition, on a sustainable pattern. These efforts may be categorized into six major categories viz; • Economic, including...