Forest department suspends anti-encroachment drive

Thiruvananthapuram: The forest department has found a way to assuage public anxiety over the misuse of Kasturirangan report by forest officials: Immediate suspension of anti-encroachment activities that have been going on for more than a quarter century.

Result: Survey activities and demarcation of forest boundaries, crucial for the prevention of encroachment, will remain on hold for an unspecified period of time.

“The Kasturirangan and Gadgil reports have instilled fear among the public and we felt it had to be addressed,” said R. Raja Raja Varma, principal chief conservator of forests. “This is only a temporary measure and it will not affect forest protection activities,” he added.

Nonetheless, Varma is not certain about the resumption of forest protection activities. “We will resume work once the people are convinced that there is nothing untoward in the activities of forest officials,” he said.

Forest officials and environment activists feel that the department had yielded to the might of certain lobbies who had engineered the anti-official sentiment.

“By setting the Thamarassery forest office on fire, the miscreants easily destroyed documents and sketches, some of which dating back to the British period, of nearly 250 sq km of forest area in the Kozhikode division,” a top forest official said. It is also feared that the suspension of survey and demarcation activities will give  a fillip to encroachment.