Chikkamagaluru: Officials of the forest department and department of animal husbandry are at loggerheads over ownership of the Basur Kaval spread across 1,710 acres in Kadur taluk of Chikkamagaluru.
The department of animal husbandry, which owns a farm established in 1949 in the area to rear the Amrith Mahal breed of cattle, gave about 300 acres of its land to the forest department for conservation of blackbucks .
But the forest department now claims that the entire Basur Kaval is a blackbuck sanctuary going by a gazette notification issued a couple of years ago.
Animal husbandry officials,however, say there are no records to establish the transfer of the entire Basur Kaval to the forest department and it remains the legitimate owner of the land in question.
The dispute turned ugly recently when forest officials dug a trench around the Kaval and started to build ponds to meet the drinking water requirements of the blackbucks and other animals as animal husbandry officials arrived to stop them from going ahead with the construction of an office in the Kaval area.
Responding to the tactics adopted by the rival department, an angry forest official declared, "We are at liberty to carry out whatever work we want here."
A watcher at the Kaval revealed forest officials had now asked the farm staff to leave claiming that the entire Kaval area belonged to them.
With neither department willing to back down, the dispute is gaining a life of its own and the losers could be the animals they are expected to protect .
