NGO
aims to end conflict - Jumbos on rampage in hills
OUR CORRESPONDENT
Shillong,
Dec. 27: Human-elephant
conflicts continue to displace many villagers
in Meghalaya’s Garo hills.
A police report said
on December 17,
a herd of wild elephants destroyed the house of Menjing Sangma and four
others
at Kalapara village in West Garo Hills.
On December 21, wild
elephants
attacked Colon M. Sangma at Rongdong village in South Garo Hills. The
victim
who sustained injuries was shifted to the civil hospital in Tura.
A forest department
official today
said the victims’ families can claim compensation according to rules
set up by
the government.
The official, however,
admitted that
the government was yet to adopt any long-term strategy to deal with
frequent
incidents of human-elephant conflict.
Last year, an injured
wild elephant
went on the rampage in many villages and killed four in the forest area
near
Selsella in West Garo Hills.
The incident forced
the villagers to
abandon the place for some days.
According to the
official, the main
reason for the conflict is the encroachment of forest areas used by
elephants
to move from one place to another.
Many of these areas
have been used
for cultivation.
To reduce
human-elephant conflict,
Garo hills-based Samrakshan Trust, an NGO, is on the job to help the
villagers.
According to the NGO,
human-elephant
conflicts occur because of conversion of barren lands for crop
production in
ways that are not compatible with the survival of the elephants.
These include
monoculture cash crops
such as cashew, areca nut, rubber, coffee and tea; horticulture crops
such as
pineapple, citrus and temperate fruits and spices such as ginger, and
cardamom.
Such conversion
permanently denudes
forests and drastically reduce the habitat suitable for the elephants
to meet
their ecological requirements.
The focus of
Samrakshan Trust’s
initiative is a “win-win” situation where farmers benefit from better
yields
without drastic change in use of land.
Kamal Medhi, the team
manager of the
NGO has recently said that learning from various experiences in the
Northeast
that have had similar objectives under comparable circumstances, “we
are
attempting to assist farmers to intensively cultivate small plots of
land with
a judicious combination of food and commercial crops”.
Shillong Times
From Our
Correspondent
TURA:A visit by a
high-level NCP delegation to a relief camp in Assam housing displaced
villagers
from East Garo Hills turned ugly after they were gheraoed by a mob,
forcing
Assam police to open blank fire and lathicharge the crowd. Union
Minister of
State for Rural Development Agatha K Sangma, Leader of the Opposition
Conrad K
Sangma and Tura MLA Purno A Sangma were in the team.
Agatha and her
delegation had paid a day-long
visit to the trouble-torn district of East Garo Hills. The Union
Minister and
her father Purno A Sangma met the State Home Minister HDR Lyngdoh,
Supply
Minister Augustine Marak and C&RD Minister FW Momin at Resubelpara
circuit
house. Both sides agreed that confidence-building measures was the need
of the hour.
Following the
meeting, the NCP team's convoy
arrived at Dilma relief camp to meet the inmates.
Having been made
aware of the exodus of a
large number of Rabhas from Resubelpara-Mendipather area into
neighbouring
Assam, the Union Minister decided to visit some of the relief camps
where
displaced were kept in that State.
The delegation,
which also included press
persons, was taken to Sotomatia village, in Dudhnoi area, where a
sizeable
number of people fleeing Garo Hills had taken shelter. Former MLA of
Dudhnoi,
Pranay Rabha, was present to welcome the NCP team.
However, a group of
people in the crowd began
to allege that houses were being torched in the vicinity of the village
and
forced the Assam police present over there to go and investigate.
As soon as the
Assam police left the venue
the crowd became agitated to see the Meghalaya delegation and tension
ran high
with shouts decrying the ongoing violence in Garo Hills ranting the air.
The mob soon
swelled to several hundreds in
number and began arming themselves with daggers, spears, machetes, axes
and
other lethal weapons. They blocked the entry and exit routes and
prevented the
vehicles from leaving the
place.
Repeated requests
to the angry crowd by PA
Sangma and Conrad Sangma to allow them to leave failed to materialize.
As security
personnel from Meghalaya put out
a security cordon around the vehicle where the Agatha and Purno Sangma
were in,
the frenzied mob demanded that the leaders come out of their vehicles.
Some in the crowd
tried to push dry straws
underneath the vehicle while others filled empty bottles with petrol.
Frantic calls were
made to the authorities in
Assam and Meghalaya as it became dark and the impasse continued for
well over
an hour.
The miscreants also
cut tree branches onto
the road and disconnected the electricity supply to the area.
As the situation
began to get out of hand
Dudhnoi police arrived on the scene but were unable to force the mob to
leave.
The Deputy
Commissioner of Goalpara, PK
Goswami, and Superintendent of police (SP) Louis Aind, arrived in the
nick of
time with two truckloads of armed police and women constables.
They opened fire in
the air and lathicharged
the crowd before the convoy could finally break free from the anger of
the mob.
"In my 35 years as
a politician I have
seen many a mob fury but not like this. As Union Labour Minister I
witnessed
mob anger from unions but today it was shocking to see men and women
suddenly
get swayed by anger and pick up lethal weapons to threaten those who
came in
peace," a shocked Purno Sangma revealed later.
"What has happened
is very
unfortunate," said Agatha Sangma and expressed hope that confidence is
built between both communities at the earliest.
Following the
unpleasant incident, the East
Garo Hills district administration has taken a decision to strongly
advise all
MLAs and ministers not to go to Assam without prior permission under
any
circumstances.
Travel from Garo
Hills to Guwahati and
Shillong through Assam has been strongly advised against, the
administration
has informed.
The
Telegraph
Villagers
rescue elephant
OUR CORRESPONDENT
Shillong,
Oct. 15:
The Balpakram National Park division of the forest
department rescued a young elephant last week with the help of the
residents of
Rongsa Awe Aking village in South Garo Hills and police.
The elephant had
fallen into a deep
gorge, while it was foraging along with the rest of the herd.
Guthan D. Shira, a
villager of
Rongsa Awe, first informed the police about the incident and requested
them to
save the elephant.
“We received an
emergency message
from the police department and our division responded immediately,”
said Pawan
Agrahari, divisional forest officer, BNP division.
It was a deep gorge
adjacent to
Jadigittim in South Garo Hills .
“The rescue effort
took a day and
villagers were a great help. We removed earth from one side of the
gorge to
pull the elephant out,” said C.G. Momin, range forest officer of the
national
park.
“We observed the
elephant until it
found the herd and disappeared into the forest,” Momin added.
Kamal Medhi, the
spokesperson for
the Samrakhsan Trust, which is engaged in preservation and conservation
of the
environment in Garo hills, said it was a positive sign that the people
are
engaged in saving the elephant.
“Conservation will be
possible only
with the active support of the people,” he added.
The
Telegraph
Bangla turtle
smugglers make a
killing
OUR CORRESPONDENT
Shillong,
Sept. 25: Bangladesh
has become the source of providing endangered
Indian flapshell turtles to markets in Meghalaya’s Garo hills.
Indian flapshell
turtles need to be protected
as these are categorised in Schedule I of the Wildlife Protection Act.
Selling,
buying or killing them is an offence.
Incidents of smuggling
turtles from
Bangladesh to Sibbari in South Garo Hills are on the rise. Three Indian
flapshell turtles were seized on Thursday from Murry Marak, a fish
vendor,
during a raid on the Sibbari market.
A forest and wildlife
official said
the illegal trade of endangered turtle species had been on along the
Bangladesh
border and Sibbari was one of the most popular markets for Indian
flapshell
turtles.
A forest official
admitted that
smugglers from Bangladesh were supplying the turtles to Garo hills.
Marak
confessed that she had bought the turtles from a Bangladeshi named
Abdul.
According to Marak, Abdul regularly supplies turtles to select vendors
in
Sibbari market. Marak was caught red-handed while selling the turtles
to a
forest official who posed as a buyer.
Forest range officer
of Balpakrem
National Park division, C.G. Momin, said the accused would be
prosecuted under
the Wildlife Protection Act and measures would be initiated to tighten
vigil
along the borders to stop illegal wildlife trade.
Investigations also
revealed that
most of the fish and vegetable vendors are involved in the sale of
turtles.
According to Momin,
the Bangladeshis
catch the turtles from rivers and bring these in utensils to sell to
fish
vendors or customers in Garo hills.
According to Momin,
while the price
for 1kg of turtle meat is Rs 250 in Bangladesh, in Sibbari market the
price is
Rs 350 a kg. The price escalates once these are smuggled to other parts
of
Meghalaya.
Kamal Medhi, the
spokesperson for
Samrakshan Trust, an NGO, today said the trust, along with the forest
department, (BNP division), had been taking the initiatives to detect
sale of
turtles.
