India is a country that generally still prefers boys over girls especially in rural places, but breaking all centuries old traditions Piplantri celebrates the birth of a girl child.
The villagers plant 111 trees every time a girl is born and 21 thousand rupees are collected from the village residents which includes 10 thousand from the girl’s father, and the total amount is deposited in a fixed deposit for the girl which matures after 20 years. Panchayat makes the parents sign an affidavit that states that they will send their daughter to school regularly, take care of the trees planted in her name, and promise to not get her married before the legal age.
It is an amazing and quite brilliant step taken by this village to ensure gender equality and to stop all the social atrocities against girls.
In the six years since the beginning of this tradition, they’ve planted over a quarter of a million trees and out of them 2 million are Aloe Vera plants.
Shouldn’t this village be labeled as Model Village of India?
By: Archa Dave
