Tadoba misery continues - Villager relocation plan goes awry

An excellent piece in Down to Earth details hwo villagers who had readily agreed to vacate their land inside the Tadoba Tiger sanctuary have become victims of official apathy and corruption. It is incumbent upon the government to ensure populations that are relocated are given adequate means to earn their livelihood. However in case of villagers who were shifted out of the core areas of TATR were left to efnd for themselves as the land given to them as part of compensation package had no means of irrigation. Depsite many request and protests, as happens in our country, officials kept passing the buck. When the villagers finally went back to TATR to protest, they were arrested. Rather than sit with them and listen and address their genuine demands, officials took extreme steps to stop them from addressing their genuine demands. It is most likely that money provided for creating irrigation facilities has been siphoned off by corrupt officials and a cover up is going on to prevent the truth from coming out. The Minister MOEF has recently done a good job by increasing the monetary compensation available to each family being relocated out of a tiger sanctuary to Rs. 10 lacs. This shoould go a long way in addressing some of the issues that crop up during relocation.

Relocation by half measure

Aparna Pallavi http://www.downtoearth.org.in/full6.asp?foldername=20090815&filename=news&sec_id=4&sid=2