India’s Most Powerful Women-Led Environmental Movements

Throughout history, women have made various efforts to make this world more just and sustainable. However, their initiatives were always treated as of secondary importance and did not receive much public recognition and support as they deserved.

India, a country which is known for its diversity in many aspects, including flora and fauna, has seen many women-led environmental movements. Indian women’s environmental engagement predates the formal label of ecofeminism; traditional roles in water management, agriculture and forest-based livelihoods made women custodians of ecological knowledge.

Ecofeminism in India is not only theoretical, but it is lived, practised, and continually negotiated in movements where gender, ecology, culture and community intersect. This Earth Day, take a look at some major women-led environmental movements.

Bishnoi Movement and the Martyrdom of Amrita Devi Bishnoi

In 1730, during the reign of Maharaja Abhay Singh of Jodhpur, royal officials were dispatched to Khejarli village to procure wood for palace construction. When they began cutting Khejri trees, Amrita Devi Bishnoi intervened. According to historical accounts, she declared that sacrificing her life to save trees would be a small price to pay for preserving nature. She embraced a tree and was executed.

Her three daughters, Asu, Ratni, and Bhagu, followed her example. Although the term ecofeminism was coined centuries later, Amrita Devi’s sacrifice illustrates a core ecofeminist doctrine that is resistance to systems that simultaneously exploit nature and marginalise women’s voices and contributions.

The eighteenth-century socio-cultural context limited women’s public leadership and engagement. Yet, Amrita Devi’s defiance challenged both royal authority and patriarchal constraints.

Women’s Leadership and Contributions in the Chipko Movement

The Chipko Movement emerged in the early 1970s in the north Indian state of Uttarakhand as a forest protection campaign characterised by villagers hugging trees to prevent commercial logging. While the movement’s tactics caught global attention, its deeper significance lies in how local heroic hill women organised, articulated ecological claims, and transformed community resistance into a national environmental movement.

Women’s leadership and contributions were eclipsed by the prominent male figures of this movement, e.g. Vimla Bahuguna, eclipsed by her famous husband, the renowned environmentalist Sunderlal Bahuguna. She played an indispensable role in mobilising women for this movement and worked closely with rural women in the Himalayan region.

In 1974, the movement witnessed one of the most influential and dynamic moments, when in Reni village, a group of women led by Gaura Devi confronted loggers face to face. When men hesitated, women, motivated by fears of fuelwood scarcity and soil erosion, blocked access to forests and protected trees.

Silent Valley Movement and Sugathakumari’s Literary Authority and Environmental Activism

Emerging in the 1970s in Kerala, the movement opposed the proposed hydroelectric project and gained momentum between 1977 and 1983, becoming one of the first modern environmental movements in India based on scientific research and public mobilisation. And in this movement, the contributions made by Sugathakumari are unforgettable. 

She founded and led the organisation Prakriti Samrakshana Samiti (Society for Protection of Nature), which became the central platform for mobilising resistance against the project. Under her leadership, the organisation organised public meetings and awareness campaigns; mobilised intellectuals, youth, and women; and created a coordinated environmental advocacy network.

Sugathakumari used her poetic voice as a political tool. Her poem “Marathinu Stuthi” (Ode to a Tree) became emblematic of the movement. Through literature, she transformed ecological concerns into emotional and moral appeals, reached wider audiences beyond scientific communities, and elevated environmental protection into a cultural and ethical discourse.

Narmada Bachao Andolan and Medha Patkar’s Leadership

The Narmada Bachao Andolan, which started in the 1980s, not only became the symbol of resistance against large-scale dam projects on the Narmada River, but it also challenged the epistemological foundations of centralised development planning.

Women were not merely participants but leaders, organisers, and ideological architects of this movement. Medha Patkar became the most visible face of the movement. Her contributions include organising padyatras (foot marches) across affected areas; leading hunger strikes, peaceful protests, and mass marches; representing displaced communities in national and international forums; awareness campaigns and media advocacy; and filing petitions in the Supreme Court of India.

 She quit her PhD course for absolute immersion with the movement. She dedicated her life to the Narmada Valley, bringing national and international attention to the plight of the displaced communities. Her leadership style emphasised non-violence, constitutional rights, rehabilitation justice and participatory mobilisation of affected communities.

Authored by Ekta Singh, a PhD Scholar in the Discipline of Gender Studies at Banaras Hindu University. Views expressed by the author are their own.