In a country like India, forests constitute a fiercely contested battlefield. Studies indicate that local communities can be powerful allies for the forest, providing protection against poachers, and regenerating the forest, observes Harini Nagendra Forests cover a third of the world’s land area, harbour twothirds of the earth’s biodiversity, and contain a major fraction of the world’s carbon, apart from providing major services such as the regulation of climate, soil and water cycles. In India, they hold a place of importance in terms of their social, cultural, and sacred values. Most forest areas in India are neither remote or pristine — over 70 per cent of our population lives in rural areas, many of these adjacent to forests. The pressure on our natural ecosystems is tremendous, while the need for maintaining forests for our future survivability is no less critical. How do we balance these dual pressures?