Paudi Bhuyans demand action against forest officials for torching their huts

BHUBANESWAR: Paudi Bhuyans of an interior tribal village of Mahulpada panchayat in Sundergarh district on Thursday demanded the Government should take necessary action to arrest and punish the forest officials who have burnt their houses at Kansaldarha near Derula village of the panchayat on April 15 this year.

According to the victims, 20 families of the paudi bhuinya community were living in the interior village Kiri for last hundred years which is around 7 km away from Mahulpada. As they were living in the forest hill top having no communication facilities, they were not getting minimum support including necessary health service provided by the Government. Accordingly the whole community decided to shift at Kansaldarha, a suitable place for habitation in the Mahulpada reserve forest near Derula village and constructed 18 huts by cleaning the forest and was living there from last October.

When the forest department came to know about their new habitation, they went to the spot and torched the 18 huts. The poor tribals lost their all the belongings including clothes, ration card, voter cards and rice in the inhuman act. “The district administration yet to take any necessary action against the culprit forest department people,” lamented on of the victims.

Members of various organisations like CSD, CSFHR, Odisha Jungle Manch, AZAM and Lok Shakti Abhiyan demanded at a Press meet here that they should be allowed to settle there at Kansaldarha since they have rights over their habitat recognised and protected under PESA, 1996 and FRA, 2006. They also demanded that if the State Government wants to settle them other than the same land, then each family should be allotted 10 acres of cultivable land near to forest and construct houses for them.

“It was a criminal offence to torch the tribal people’s houses and also the forest officials have violated the Forest Rights Act and the PESA. The violators of human rights should be punished under the law,” said Lok Shakti Abhiyan convener Prafulla Samantaray.