Southern States - Kerala

Eviction at Mathikettan being `scuttled'

By G. Prabhakaran

PALAKKAD MAY 3. The powerful `forest mafia' who had encroached upon thousands of acres of evergreen forest in Mathikettan is delaying summary eviction to get court stays.

The Forest Department proposal for summary eviction is bring scuttled allegedly by the Revenue Department, which has taken the position that the matter has to be referred to the Law Department. The Revenue Department is said to have pleaded for giving the encroachers one more opportunity

to produce documents of their claims on the forest land. They want to have another sitting on May 10, 2002 to verify the encroachers' documents.

But this is seen as a clever move to get stay orders from the lower courts in Idukki to stop eviction. Reports from Idukki revealed that already some encroachers had approached courts to get stay orders. Delaying evictions for a few weeks will also bring the onset of monsoon, making it impossible to conduct eviction operations.

The Commission, headed by the Additional Chief Secretary, Chandrasekharan Nair, that verified the documents produced by some encroachers could not find even a single legal document and the oldest document produced was of 1954. Most of the documents examined revealed that they had been fabricated and had no legal validity. The so-called `patta' issued by the Revenue Department was also found to be illegal as most of them were issued recently and had no validity in this Reserve Forest area.

The Committee members - the Revenue Secretary, Sajan Peter, and the Forest Secretary, Bharat Bhushan, are learnt to have got convinced about the large-scale destruction of forests and killing of wild animals in Mathikettan. The local people have also given them information about the involvement of a close relative of the son-in-law of a Minister in the encroachment. But it is a major problem for the officials to substantiate the allegation of some of those who have deposed before the commission.

When large scale encroachment of forest land took place in Mathikettan in 1995 with the help of the L.C cases booked by the Revenue Department officials, the Forest Range Officer of Devikulam wrote to the Assistant Collector, Devikulam, on August 18, 1995 requesting him to evict the encroachers. The Forest Department then promised to "provide maximum staff for this operation'' and wanted to commence the eviction immediately.

But the Assistant Collector, Devikulam, in his telephonic directive on October 14, 1995 directed the Range Officer, Devikulam, to postpone the eviction.

The Range Officer of Devikulam wrote to the Assistant Collector to inform him of "the next date for eviction at the earliest.'' He wrote that the encroachment of the Cardamom Hill Reserve and other cardamom areas should be settled at the earliest. It is pointed out that the Assistant Collector would not have stopped the eviction of encroachment of the Mathikettan forests without orders from the higher-ups in the Government. Significantly, K.M. Mani was the then Revenue Minister.

As feared, the stoppage of eviction in 1995 resulted in large-scale encroachment in Mathikettan, especially during the last one year after the UDF returned to power and K.M. Mani took over as the Revenue Minister. The summary eviction is deliberately delayed by the Revenue and Law Department under the plea that the encroachers should be given another hearing on May 10, 2002.

Nature lovers and environmentalists who do not trust the official Commission or the Government said that they would approach the Supreme Court pleading to take action against the top functionaries in the Government, the Revenue and Forest Departments for violating the Central Forest Conservation Act of 1980 and the recent landmark Supreme Court judgment on the Thirumulpad Godavarma case that had asked for the protection of all forests including that in the ownership of private individuals.

The Thiruvamkulam Nature Lovers Movement approached the High Court and got stay for any allotment of forest land for non-forestry purposes at Mathikettan Mala. .

The environmentalists pointed out that if the Government did not take action to implement the Central Forest Conservation Act and the subsequent Supreme Court orders, they would be held up for contempt of the Apex Court order and for violation of the Conservation Act.

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• Mani willing to forfeit forest land control
• Sudhakaran hails Mani's offer
• Eviction at Mathikettan being `scuttled'
• Janu asks CM to prosecute forest ranger
• Joseph calls for immediate removal of encroachers
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• `CM covering up forest mafia involvement'
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