There may be many big wigs from 200 or more countries talking about climate and greening of our plant now, but it has been a perrenial theme in India from the day our nation was born. The British devastated our country taking away everything on the ground and the ground beneath and laid the country bare and barren. Our national leaders at that time realized the sad look of the barren land and conceived the idea of greening the country, in fits and starts.
This is what our national leader Nehru spoke some 60 years ago, "...It was a matter of surprise to him that so far no interest had been taken in tree plantation. Large tracts of the country had become deserts owing to the negligence of the people who cut trees without realizing their great value...." There should be a law that no one should cut a tree unless he had first planted a new one in its place."[wikipedia]. Nehru, Lady Mountabatten planted trees in Delhi.
The Gujarathi activist K. M. Munshi who held many positions including the ministry of agriculture and food took it to the next step and made it a traiditon to plant trees in July every year and renamed it the 'Van Mahotsav'. That was in 1950s. "Van Mahotsav" in Sanskrit roughly translates to Forest Festival or Celebration of the Forest.
https://science.thewire.in/environment/van-mahotsav-green-india-mission-climate-change/
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