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With the motivation and support of friends & members {from INDIA as well as friends living in USA, CANADA, Britain (Uttarakhand Yahoo Group based in BOSTAN)} and financial support of DELHI FORUM, Action Aid, PEACE, CSE as well as of few individuals, we have successfully work in the direction of creating an environment of reasoned debate on development choices. In the sprit of forum’s theme, we have developed our working style with fourth fold division, as following:

  1. Policy Intervention - We conducted discussion, debate and workshop on “Developing a Pro-People Forest Policy” at various level from Seminar room of Jawaharlal Nehru University to remote village of Uttarakashi.

  1. Information Dissemination: The forum had been endeavoring to integrate research, advocacy and communication in order to create pressure group at various levels. In this regard the forum brought out two newsletters in collaboration with Delhi Forum.

    1. The Making of Uttarakhand (UPDATE, Issue No 126, November 15, 2000) presents an in depth analysis of the Uttarakhand movement, including the contemporary socio-economic and political scenario in the newly formed state.

Gharat: The Wheel of Life (Update Issue No 131, march 28th 2001) provided an informative account of the traditional watermills with their socio-cultural and economic implications for he region.

Jan Ghoshna Patra: People’s Manifesto (before Assembly election 2002):-

    1. With the mandate of policy invention and advocacy, the organization had conducted meetings /discussion/ workshops at various level with the people from different walks of life (from academicians of JNU to village Pradhan of remote village of Chamoli Garhwal) and collected and compiled peoples’ views in a small booklet form with the name ‘JAN GHOSHNA PATRA’ and widely distributed it.
    1. Apart from this, the forum has organized the debate/discussion on the issues affecting the people of Uttarakahnd Viz. ‘Tribes in Uttarakhand’, ‘The Problem of Leopards’, ‘the Political Scenario of Uttarakhand’, and Issue of People living in ‘the Nanda Devi Bio Sphere’. All the information collected during these debates was widely circulated in the form of pamphlets.

  1. Campaign: In continuation of the earth day celebration ‘the FORUM’ in association with Delhi Forum coordinated the Uttarakhand area for the Programmes on the International Earth Day series for the Year 2001. Earth day is a movement for saving and protecting nature and mother earth. The world wide theme for the year 2001 being “ Clean energy and Energy Efficiency”, the forum initiated a campaign movement for the revival of traditional watermills (Gharats) in the hills at two level (Policy makers and Users’s level). The campaign was initiated at five places – Kausani, Pithragarh, Gopeshwar, Pipalkoti and Dehradun- in collaboration with the local schools and colleges, academicians, social activists, NGOs and others.

  1. Resource Initiatives: The Forum had been earnestly pursuing its foremost aim of functioning as a resource center in Delhi for information support to the youth, students and others from the region. It disseminated information to various colleges and institutions regarding the higher learning opportunities out side Uttarakhand. In addition to making available the required forms, it also made lodging arrangement whenever required.

For a more then four year the forum had successfully networked with various institutions and social organization to gather essential regional information. This aims at facilitating the student community to take up more relevant research initiatives with an eye to the development issues in the region.

Year 2002-03:

Year 2002-03 was a turning point for the Forum as MANISHA JOSHI left the JNU for pursuing her higher studies in HARWARD University, SACHIN Left for MBA, NILESH ARYA got married and left the Delhi, KAMLA DHAULAKHANDI joined the lectureship at Pithoragarh, and PREM BAHUKHANDI also left Delhi for his Ph.D field work. This is the worldwide story of ‘student initiatives’ as the student community is a very volatile community. So for last three year this very promising forum could not functioned because of the lake of leadership.

Now after three years, all the team members like PREM BAHUKHANDI, NILESH ARYA, RAJEEV SHARMA are in Delhi, PRATIBHA and SACHIN are in Shimla, KAMALA had agreed to give time, and MANISHA JOSHI is planning to return to India after finishing her Ph.D., So we have decided to renovate our activities with a new name (Friends of Himalayas) with broader area of ‘Himalayas’ rather then ‘Uttarakhand’ only. Although ‘Uttarakhand’ will be the major focused area of our activities but we will try to network in the other Himalayan States too as more or less the problem and issues in all the Himalayan states are same.