Bishnoi community model: an Indian Ecological Feminist approach to environment protection

Abstract

PurposeAs a solution to these crises, bringing back the feminine sensitivity can become a welcome change. The Bishnoi community, in particular, propagated Eco-feminism for the cause of the environment. Therefore, this paper aims to study the community in detail along with suggesting a Bishnoi Environment Protection Model as an Indian indigenous solution to the global environmental problems.Design/methodology/approachThe method of obtaining information was a detailed questionnaire-based interview along with multiple focus group discussions. The interviews were conducted with the women who belong to the Bishnoi community and who are actively taking forward the ethos of their community. Interviews were conducted across a span of different villages to cover a different portion of the Bishnoi population. Adding to this, multiple focus group discussions took place in the temple, wild-life protection center, Self-help group women's households, community meetings.FindingsReligion and science are complementary and supplementary to each other in the true sense. It would be good to recall what the greatest scientist had said “Science without religion is blind and religion without science is lame”.Research limitations/implicationsThe research limitation of this paper is that it is a field study-based research wherein the research findings are the outcomes of personal interviews with the village community people. The limitation, therefore, lies in the simplicity of the research arguments put forward in this paper. The implication of this research would be to challenge the dominant research paradigms in the field of Eco-feminism and Climate Change and bring grass root narratives to the forefront.Practical implicationsThe practical implication of this research paper is that in Environment related policy solutions, rural women should be appointed as consultants of advisors in the high profile decision-making policy groups. It would make the process very democratic and rooted in ground-level solutions. If the Bishnoi community women of India are given their due regard they would eventually play significant roles in the decision-making groups at the national and international levels.Social implicationsOther than having a policy implication, this research paper has a social implication too. The community narratives which have been hidden for so long in the remote villages of India will come to the forefront and help as a guiding force.Originality/valueThis paper recommends that India should propagate its culturally-rooted principles such as the one in Jambhoji's commandments. India should strongly put these normative values in the international organizations and contribute to a new epistemology of knowledge in the counter effect of existing ones. This would make a paradigm shift at the level of the knowledge-power in which the developed nations manipulate the rest of the world. The new terminologies, concepts, agendas, goals should be formulated by deriving the knowledge from age-old communities in India. The people of these communities have even given their lives for the protection of the environment.