Miscreants create havoc at Ranga Reserve Forest, fire shots at Assam forest officials

A CORRESPONDENT

LAKHIMPUR: Just two days after inking the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) in New Delhi by Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma and his Arunachal Pradesh counterpart Pema Khandu to resolve all boundary issues between the two states, the aggressive encroachers from Arunanchal Pradesh once again created havoc in the Ranga Reserve Forest located in the border area under Lakhimpur district.

The Arunachali miscreants once again targeted Assam forest officials with their guns on Saturday in order to continue their aggression by encroaching upon the land of Assam under the said reserve forest. This fresh firing incident took place at Rampur Beat of the Reserve Forest.

As per the report found from the Rampur Beat Officer, some forest employees along with a few local people went to clean and conduct gap maintenance work at a wooden garden that was set up at Rampur Beat by the Rampur Deury Joint Forest Management Committee under the Forest Department. The local people are the beneficiaries of the project being implemented. While they were working, some Arunachali people arrived at the garden. The Arunachali people clicked some photographs of the working Assam Forest officials and the beneficiaries and then went away. Following the Arunachali people, when the Assam forest officials arrived at the other end of the garden, they saw that a group of fifty to sixty Arunachali people had been busy in deforestation by cutting trees under the Rampur. On seeing the Assam forest officials, the Arunachali people became aggressive and threatened them to go back. At that time, though the Assam forest officials requested the Arunachali people not to continue deforestation, some of them created havoc by firing in the air. At this point, Assam forest officials, led by the Rampur beat officer, were compelled to retreat from the place.

Later, on receiving the information about the incident, Harmoti Range Officer Gunajit Talukder, Lakhimpur SP Bedanta Madhav Rajkhowa, and the Circle Officer of Naoboicha Revenue Circle arrived at Rampur Beat and inspected the deforested area caused by Arunachali encroachers.

Meanwhile, the Lakhimpur Divisional Forest Office filed a case at the Silonibari Police Outpost regarding the incident.

Notably, another firing incident took place at Jutuli Bagan area under the same Rampur Beat of the said Reserve Forest on April 7, while a team of Assam forest officials from Lakhimpur Forest Division, led by Ashok Kumar Das, Assistant Conservator of Forest, arrived at the Forest Beat to make an inquiry into an encroached area. Some days ago, Arunachali encroachers built several infrastructures and houses at Jutuli Bagan by destroying the vegetation there.