8 June , Delhi:The Ministry of Environment and Forests, instituted an award called “Indira Gandhi Paryavaran Puraskar “, in the year 1987 to give recognition to those having made or have the potential to make the measurable and major impact in the protection of environment.
The governing body of the IGPP revised also revised and instituted from the year 2005 one prize of Rs.5,00,000/- under the Organisation category, and two prizes of Rs.3,00,000/- and Rs.2,00,000/- each to individuals in the Individual category to be given annually. Along with the cash prize, each awardee is given a silver lotus trophy and a citation
For the year 2005, the Ministry received a total number of 190 nominations (125 individuals and 65 organisations) out of which 34 nominations (22 individual and 12 organisations) were short listed by the expert members. The ground-truth verification of these short listed nominations have been carried out by the Regional Offices of the Ministry.
Dr. Amrita Patel was born on 13th November, 1943. She is a Veterinary Science graduate from Bombay University. Presently she is the Chairperson of the National Dairy Development Board, Anand, Gujarat. She has set up the National Tree Growers Co-operative Federation in 1988. She was also instrumental in setting up of the Foundation for Ecological Security in 2001.
Under her guidance the National Tree Growers Co-operative Federation progressed from a pilot project to an organization working in seven states on regenerating thousands of hectares of the degraded revenue wastelands through village based Tree Growers Cooperative Societies. Under her Chairpersonship, the Foundation for Ecological Security has grown to secure the co-operation of 992 villages across seven states, situated in nine locations and spread across five different agro-ecosystems n a period of five years. Altogether about 75,200 hectares of revenue wastelands and forestlands have been brought under ecologically enlightened community governance and about 33,000 hectares brought under improved vegetative cover.
Dr. Patel has initiated a pilot project under which three milk unions in the State of Karnataka set up rainwater harvesting structures in their milk processing plants in order to conserve rainwater to meet their potable water requirements. She has also done work on energy conservation, environment education and watershed development.
Indira Gandhi Paryavaran Puraskar-2005 (Individual Category- Rs. 2.0 lakh) is awarded to Dr. Amrita Patel for her wide ranging and incisive contributions to environmental conservation and awareness.