The Karnataka-based environmentalist, Tulsi Gowda, was awarded the Padma Shri, the country’s fourth highest civilian award, by President Ram Nath Kovind on November 8, 2021 for her social work. She was one among 61 persons who were awarded the Padma Shri Awards 2020.
Tulsi Gowda belongs to the Halakki indigenous tribal community in Uttara Kannada district of Karnataka. She is known as ‘Encyclopedia of Forests’ as she possesses in-depth knowledge of plants and herbs.
Born in 1944 at Honnali village in Ankola taluk, Tulsi Gowda lost her father at the age of 2. She started working at a local nursery with her mother, who was a daily-wage worker, from the age of 12. She lost her husband at an early age. Though she never received a formal education, she has a vast knowledge of diverse species of plants and herbs—nearly every tree species in the forests of the region. She has the capability to recognise the condition of any plant by a simple touch. This fetched her a permanent job in the Karnataka Forest department where she served for 14 years, retiring with a pension on which she lives.
Tulsi Gowda has planted more than 30,000 saplings and looks after the nurseries of the forest department. She has been teaching the children of her village about the importance of the forests as well as how to find seeds and care for them.
In addition to the Padma Shri, Tulsi Gowda has received numerous awards for her work in seed development and conservation. In 1986, she was conferred the Indira Priyadarshini Vrikshamitra Award. In 1999, she was awarded the Karnataka Rajyotsava Award, which is the second highest civilian honour of Karnataka.
Apart from environmentalism, Tulsi Gowda has championed for the rights of the oppressed in her village. On an instance when another Halakki woman was threatened with a gun after an altercation, Gowda came to her aid stating that she would protest fiercely if the perpetrator of the crime was not punished.
© Spectrum Books Pvt Ltd.