M A I N   N E W S

Shivalik Hills up for grabs!
Land mafia felling trees to pave way for roads
Rajmeet Singh/TNS

Roads being carved out by unscrupulous elements after cutting ecologically fragile Shivalik Hills in villages of Majri block located on Chandigarh’s periphery. A Tribune photograph

Chandigarh, May 11
Eco-fragile Shivalik Hills in Chandigarh’s periphery are up for sale! Sounds incredible but that’s true. For, a handful of local politicians-turned-property dealers are, in a bid to make a fast buck, allegedly selling farmhouse sites after illegally carving roads through undulating hillocks that form the part of Punjab’s protected forest cover.

Notably, activities such as felling of trees, construction, levelling of land, laying of new roads, etc, stand banned in the area under the Indian Forest Act 1927, Forest Control Act 1980 and the Punjab Land Preservation Act 1900. Also, these Acts empower Forest officials not only to stop construction work, but even arrest violators, if any, and confiscate their machinery.

Still, the illegal activity is unabated here. The unscrupulous elements have, by using heavy machinery, uprooted hundreds of trees to pave way for access roads to farmhouse sites sold to “outsiders” in the area. At the target of land mafia are hillocks spread over 1,500 acres of common village land in Majri block comprising of five villages — Bhagindi, Gurdha, Kasauli, Jyanti Majri and Karaundewala.

For their part, the Forest officials concerned prefer to keep themselves amused in red tape like “writing letters to different departments”. Pal Singh, sarpanch of Bhagindi village, said: “We have approached the forest officials several times to get the illegal activity stopped, but to no avail. Instead, we are threatened by the henchmen of violators who move around in a convoy of SUVs.”

Jagir Ram of Kasauli village rued: “First they (read as Forest officials) adopt a wait-and-watch policy, then get into the act when the irreversible has been done. For, it suits both, the Forest Department and the violator. They don’t have the guts to stop the influential persons.”

Confirming the laying of roads, Parveen Kumar, the Conservator of Forests, Shivalik Hills, who visited the spot on April 30, said: “We have issued six damage reports after taking note of ‘kutcha’ passages in the area.”

Ropar Divisional Forest Officer K. Kannan said letters had been written to the Mohali Deputy Commissioner and SSP seeking force to stop the work. “We have also written to the District Development and Panchayat Officer and the drainage department,” added Kannan.

A Forest official revealed on anonymity that there was immense pressure from politicians to let the illegal activity go unchecked here. Whenever our official goes to the spot to stop the work, a phone call from a high-up freezes all action. Several roads near Karaundewala-Kasauli and Gurdha villages have already been constructed through the hillocks that are home to a number of wildlife species.

“It is a systematic scam in which the unscrupulous elements in connivance with revenue officials are tampering with land records to encroach upon others share and then level hillocks for monetary gains. It cannot happen without the blessing of politicians and senior officials,” Gurpartap Singh Gill, an advocate who has been fighting the cause of the villagers, said.