Committee pulls up forest department for inaction

Bangalore, July 26 (UNI) The Joint House Committee probing land grabbing in Bangalore urban district today came down heavily on the State Forest Department for its inaction to curb encroachment of valuable Bannerughatta National Park and other forest lands near the city to the tune of 2225 acres.

The committee, in its second report submitted to the state legislature said, ''the Forest Department does not have the will power and is impotent to take any tangible action to arrest and evict the encroachers in the National Park area despite being amply empowered under the Karnataka Forest Act, 1963''.

The Committee headed by A T Ramaswamy has revealed that 813 acres of Bannerughatta National Park out of a total area of 18,198 acres had been encroached by 558 encroachers. In addition, the report said an area of 1099 acres of Bangalore Urban Forest area and 313 acres of Bangalore Urban Tanks had been encroached by 865 encroachers.

The Committee wondered ''how forest officials kept quiet when these illegal activities were going on for over ten years and how the local bodies gave permission to build houses in forest land''.

It said ''it is quite likely that some important and powerful persons had formed layouts in tank beds and have sold to the city residents''. The forest department had not even given the extent of encroachment by each person while giving the total area of encroachment as 312 acres and 33 guntas.

The Committee said the department was paralysed and collusion between Forest Department officials and encroachers was quite evident.

Encroachment of Turahalli Minor forests and Bannerughatta National Park were only two examples of the 'deep disease' affecting the forest department, the report said.

The committee has recommended the government to take action against concerned forest department officials for criminal negligence.

UNI