Villagers of the Bishnoi community embraced khejri trees with their bodies to prevent their felling. The khejri tree’s ecological and cultural significance for desert life, coupled with the Bishnoi doctrine that forbade cutting these trees, turned their act into a defining moment of ecological defiance long before formal environmental movements emerged. 363 villagers died while trying to peacefully protect the trees from being chopped down on the orders of the Maharaja of Marwar, who had sent his soldiers to cut the trees to provide wood for a new palace.