12 Facts About Sunderlal Bahuguna

Sunderlal Bahuguna Ji was an Indian environmentalist and Chipko movement leader.

Sunderlal Bahuguna fought for the preservation of forests in the Himalayas, first as a member of the Chipko movement in the 1970s, and later spearheaded the anti-Tehri Dam movement from the 1980s to early 2004.

Sunderlal Bahuguna was one of the early environmentalists of India, and later he and others associated with the Chipko movement and started taking up wider environmental issues, such as being opposed to large dams.

Sunderlal Bahuguna was born in the village Maroda near Tehri, Uttarakhand.

Sunderlal Bahuguna started social activities at the age of 13, under the guidance of Shri Dev Suman, who was a nationalist spreading a message of non-violence, and he was with the Congress Party of Uttar Pradesh at the time of Independence.

Sunderlal Bahuguna adopted Gandhian principles in his life and married his wife Vimla with the condition that they would live among rural people and establish ashram in village.

Sunderlal Bahuguna helped bring the movement to prominence through a 5,000-kilometer trans-Himalaya march undertaken from 1981 to 1983, traveling from village to village, gathering support for the movement.

Sunderlal Bahuguna had an appointment with the then Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi and that meeting is credited with resulting in Gandhi's subsequent 15-year ban on cutting of green trees in 1980.

Sunderlal Bahuguna was closely associated with Gaura Devi, one of the pioneers of the movement.

Sunderlal Bahuguna used Satyagraha methods and repeatedly went on hunger strikes at the banks of Bhagirathi as a mark of his protest.

Sunderlal Bahuguna had visited the region in 1979 to help in the campaign against the proposed Bedthi hydroelectric project.

Sunderlal Bahuguna died on May 21,2021, due to COVID-19 complications.