Women for centuries have shared an innate connection with the environment. Nature is embedded in the work women engage with and thus, for generations, they have worked hard to conserve it for themselves and future generations. Forests and rivers preserved for thousands of years are now threatened across the planet. Unregulated development, extraction, deforestation, carbon emissions have led to serious environmental, health, and social justice implications. Studies show that these implications are not equally borne by all. The perpetrators of environmental and social injustice are the ones least impacted by it. People, especially women, belonging to disadvantaged caste and class suffer the most from these atrocities. Joan Davidson, a writer talks about how, in Rajasthan, over the last few decades, the water table has been declining due to the introduction of sugarcane, a water-intensive cash crop. Many water sources have also been polluted due to the use of pesticides in farms and industries. Because of this and growing pressures of climate change, women, of low-income households, are spending increasingly more time each year fetching water from far away sources. She also says the same for deforestation. When forests are cleared from around the village, the burden of procuring herbal medicine, fuel, and fodder from distant forests lies with women in most parts of the country. Unfortunately, these hardships are rarely accounted for while planning for any development policy or project. However, women have now started to take an active part in the conservation of the resources they heavily depend upon. Apart from these reasons to fight for the environment, many women activists around the world are leading environmental movements against powerful lobbyists to alter the course of our otherwise predicted future.

Women, as young as twelve years old Ridhima Pandey of India who is fighting the climate injustice through a legal battle, Greta Thunberg, a Swedish activist, who has inspired millions of youngsters to protest all over the world or Marina Silva an activist who took to politics to save the Brazilian rainforests, have taken it upon themselves to bring a greater consciousness to these matters. And there are many names to this list of women champions fighting the battle to ensure environmental and social justice to all. Women have been playing a very powerful role in positively shaping our environment all across the globe. The stories of these women may now seem overwhelming, but they all have had humble beginnings, many of them starting individually as the world slowly joined in.

​

In the contemporary Indian context, women have been using the platform of Mahila Mandals to raise awareness about many environmental issues pertaining to them and the community at large. Last year, on a short trip to Lahaul, I learned more about the Mahila mandals of Lahaul from a good friend, Shiv kumar, in  Udaipur. He told me about how the women of Lahaul were very active leaders of their villages and