By Arun Pratap Singh
Dehradun, 26 May: Senior BJP leader Ravindra Jugran today met Chief Secretary Anand Bardhan and submitted a memorandum of demands regarding community rights of the villagers in hill districts. After the meeting, Jugran described his meeting with the Chief Secretary as positive and claimed that the official expressed positive views regarding his demands.
In his letter, Jugran has pointed out certain incidents. Citing an incident of two years ago, he shared that certain women villagers from near Joshimath were prevented by the officials from collecting fuel wood and grass. He reminded that this incident had hit the headlines in the media and the hill folk felt extremely anguished over the development.
He cited another incident that happened in village Rudrapur near Guptkashi in district Rudraprayag, adding that an entire 2.5 hectare of land of the villagers was acquired by the administration for a project of PTCUL and this led to a long conflict between the villagers and the administration. He reminded that this dispute is still unresolved and is pending with the Uttarakhand High Court.
Jugran claimed that both these incidents are pointers to the fact that the situation regarding the community rights of the villagers in the hills is pitiful and apathy towards this results in needless exploitation and suffering of the hill folk.
He reminded that community rights of the villagers in the nearby forests for collection of fuelwood, grass, collection of honey, fruits and mushroom, etc., have traditionally existed but in the present times, the villagers are having to struggle for their traditional rights without much success.
Jugran demanded that the KUZA Act in the hills in the state be replaced with the ZA Act like in the plains and that land managing committees be set up to manage the community assets and forests. He also demanded that all villagers living in or around the forests in the hills be declared as forest dwellers and granted forest rights by setting up committees or bodies to ensure this.
