BENGALURU: As against the announcement of forest, environment and ecology minister Eshwar Khandre to clear encroachments from forest lands at the earliest, the ground reality is different.
The forest staffers on the ground are going slow with evicting large encroachers and are buying time stating that surveys needs to be done. A senior forest department official, from the ground, not wanting to be named said: “The minister had announced that large encroachments above three acres will be targeted first and evicted.
But on ground we are not doing that. We have been told to go slow by the politicians as this will be one of the issues for the elections. So while we are working on small encroachers, incase of large encroachers, we are resurveying the properties and the records so that there are no errors.”
According to forest department officials, large parcels of forest land have been encroached upon in places like Kolar, Hassan, Chikkamagalur, Kodagu, Bengaluru and its outskirts.
The official added that the concern is not so much incase of Bengaluru as most of the cases of encroachment are under litigation.
“Work on clearing of properties and encroachments is ongoing. We are doing the surveys and service notices. The cases which are being addressed now are ongoing matters. Also the directions issued by the minister to clear encroachments, does not include Bengaluru in its ambit” the official said.
The minister had said that around two lakh hectares of forest land has been encroached upon and most of it is Kodagu and Uttara Kannada districts. He had said that forest officials have been directed to recover land from large encroachers, who have encroached land measuring three acres and above. He had also mentioned that land clearance will be done on priority basis as and when details are obtained.
