Self-initiated effort for the protection and management of natural resources is a traditional practice among different tribal communities in India including the northeast region of India. Such practices were started long before the post-independence initiative of Joint Forest Management, watershed development, or other government programs. The self-Initiated Forest Protection System is fundamentally a decentralized grass root movement initiated largely by small villages to protect their immediate natural resource base to sustain their livelihood. Traditional local institutions play a major role in regulating the forest resources protected under this system through the customary role of stakeholders, their rights and responsibilities. It supports the villagers' material needs besides maintaining the locality's ecological sustainability. It is an approach to the survival of the eco-system people, which is very common among various tribal groups of northeast India, where they live in an isolated location, created by different geographical situations, which ultimately helps evolve a unique way of life. This paper highlights two different case studies representing two different facets of this unique practice among the Rabha, Karbi and Garo tribal communities of Goalpara and Karbi Anglong district. Population pressure due to inward migration and the resulting depletion of forest cover and forest biomass has been found to be the major causes of such initiative in the study area. The traditional mechanism of these tribal people has been the major driving force behind the successful conservation of forest resources.