Girl at Pedtalli Village near Mahan Forest

Billionaire corporations Essar & Hindalco, among India’s most powerful business families, have been given the green light by the Indian government earlier this year to dig up a new open cast coal mine in the Mahan forest in Madhya Pradesh, an unspoilt area home to tribal populations as well as endangered wildlife such as elephants, leopards, and possibly even tigers. What makes Mahan critical is its status as the last remaining patch of dense, unfragmented forest in the central Indian landscape. Wiping out this verdant forest teeming with wildlife will pave the way for the surrounding forests in the region to get the axe for profits.The forest clearance involved will have an impact on the 50,000-plus people from 54 villages depending on this forest for their livelihoods, and two whole villages face being razed to the ground and their inhabitants being relocated to the infamous ‘resettlement colonies’ – grim concrete blocks where villagers live in often squalid conditions.