ABSTRACT
Analysis of the processes involved in and the pros and cons of displacement and relocation of forest-dwelling communities from a gender perspective is of recent origin in India. This is primarily due to the fact that the main discourse on development has been male centric. While displacement, in general, upsets the livelihoods of forest-dependent communities, it has a differential impact on women because of gender-induced disabilities. Policy interventions aimed at forest conservation have often resulted in large-scale displacement of forest-dependent communities.
The displacement discourse has most often not taken into consideration the divisions created by class, caste, gender and location and has generally treated women as passive dependents of male members of their families. Women’s narratives rarely find a place in the official and academic documentations of the resettlement processes, the exceptions being select studies carried out in an eco-feminist framework. It is in this context that the present chapter assumes significance. It tries to analyse the post-resettlement impacts on communities relocated from Bhadra Tiger Reserve and Nagarahole National Park in the state of Karnataka. The arguments in this chapter are proposed to be analysed in the eco-feminist framework.
