ADILABAD: The face-off between tribal land rights and tiger conservation has intensified in the core areas of Kawal Tiger Reserve, with forest officials arresting 26 people for allegedly felling hundreds of trees and encroaching on protected land. While the tribals claim ancestral rights, officials maintain the land has been a designated reserve for decades.
Officials said groups from 10 to 15 villages in Jainoor, Sirpur (U) and Lingapur mandals formed a gang of about 50 people, entered the Palaghori area in Sonapur beat, felled nearly 400 trees and erected huts in Jannaram division, Mancherial district. The arrested persons were produced before the Luxettipet court, which remanded them to 14 days in judicial custody.
Forest authorities noted that many of those arrested already hold ROFR pattas in their native villages, raising questions about why they moved into the core reserve. Revenue records, they said, clearly identify the land as forest, classified as reserved forest since 1940, declared a wildlife sanctuary in 1999 and notified as a tiger reserve in 2011.
Encroachment has been a recurring issue. In the previous week, forest officials tried to reclaim about 100 acres in Dhamanapet, Dhandapalli mandal. In 2023, tribals encroached nearly 100 acres in Koyapichiguda, Dhandapalli mandal. Officials say such encroachments disrupt herbivore habitats and hinder tiger settlement in the reserve, where big cats had recently migrated from Tipeshwar Tiger Reserve and Wildlife Sanctuary in Maharashtra.
Political assurances have also fuelled expectations. Former chief minister YS Rajasekhara Reddy issued pattas in 2005, and later K Chandrasekhar Rao sanctioned a few more before elections. Tribals now hope for fresh pattas, which officials fear is driving the latest wave of forest clearance.