Ahad Miah has come a long way from his tree felling days. He is now one of the custodians of the Lauachhara protected forest, working shoulder to shoulder with government appointed forest guards.

The case of the effort to build a small dam in Bhulaveda in Paschim Midnapur district of West Bengal shows that in struggles between government agencies and local self-government, the losers are often the villagers themselves.

In September 2004, a group of students from the Wildlife Institute of India (wii), Dehradun, went to the Sariska Tiger Reserve of Rajasthan for training. Excited about their work, they painstakingly trekked through the hilly 866 square kilometres (sq km) reserve. They couldn't spot a single tiger. Alarmed, they informed A J T Johnsingh, dean, department of animal ecology and conservation biology, wii.

To make community forest management a success