‘Our bones are made of Iron’: the political ecology of Garhwali women’s activism Georgina Drew The University of Adelaide In the Garhwal Himalaya of India’s Uttarakhand State, a series of social movements emerged in the late 2000s to contest hydroelectric dams on a tributary of the sacred River Ganga. Within these opposition movements, men often took high-profile leadership roles whereas women from a range of socio-economic backgrounds formed the overwhelming base of participation at meet- ings, assemblies, and rallies. This article draws from event-based participation and semi-struc- tured interviews to explore the diverse concerns that women gave to explain their engagements with opposition efforts. I counter essentialist frames and employ a feminist political ecology approach to argue that the gendered dynamics are attributable to historical, cultural, religious, and political-economic influences. The article contributes to anthropologies of gender, environ- ment, and social movements by taking an approach focused on disparities of practice and power that helps situate Garhwali women’s roles in development contestations. Keywords: gender and environment, political ecology, social movements, hydroelectric devel- opment, River Ganga, Garhwal India INTRODUCTION Development projects are highly contested along the upper reaches of India’s River Ganga, an entity revered by Hindus as a living Goddess. The preliminary construction of three new dams on the Bhagirathi tributary (or ‘Bhagirathi Ganga’ as I will refer to it henceforth) inspired heated commentary and social movement activity from 2006 to 2010. Although some cited the need for regional employment and electricity gener- ation, the destruction caused by these ‘run-of-the-river’ 1 dams was opposed by a range of people who worried about ecological integrity as well as the cultural and religious implications of diverting sacred waters out of the riverbed and into the mountains through a series of long tunnels. To stop the projects and the reduced flow they would have entailed, activists pressured the state and the central government for 5 years. In response to the opposition, the dams were canceled by the Indian state on 26 August 2010. Along with this announcement, the government proposed that the first 125 km of the river that flows from a glacial source to the district capital of Uttarkashi would become an ‘ecologically sensitive zone’ upon which no future projects would be built. The Australian Journal of Anthropology (2014) 25, 287–303 doi:10.1111/taja.12106 © 2014 Australian Anthropological Society 287