The Hindu : Kerala News : Lease rental on forest land to be revised

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, Jul 15, 2004

Kerala

Kerala

Lease rental on forest land to be revised

By Our Staff Reporter

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM, JULY 14. The State Government proposes to enhance the lease amount on forest land now in the possession of private parties. Announcing this in the Assembly today, K. Sudhakaran, Forest Minister, said an amount of Rs. 58 crores had been found to be outstanding against lessees holding possession of forest land belonging to the State.

The Department of Forests has set up 14 retail depots for the sale of timber, through which 640 metric tonnes of wood were sold out. The income from timber sales amounted to Rs. 119 lakhs in the last financial year, Mr. Sudhakaran said.

Efforts were on to evict all encroachers from the forest land even in the face of opposition from those patronising them.

A major hurdle in the process of eviction was the support being extended to the encroachers by political parties of all hues.

Over 500 acres of forest land in Wayanad had been encroached by the Adivasi Kshema Samithy under the control of the CPI(M). The Minister called upon all political parties to desist from patronising encroachment of forest land.

The Minister for Food and Civil Supplies and Devaswom, G. Karthikeyan, informed the House that the Travancore Devaswom Board (TDB) had appealed to the Centre, through the Public Accounts Committee of Parliament, to set apart 500 acres of forest land in and around the Sabarimala temple for the benefit of the pilgrims visiting the shrine. On the condition that no damage would be caused to the environment, the TDB had also requested that the area in question be delinked from the Periyar Tiger Reserve. A final decision in this regard had to be taken by the Union Ministry of Environment, he said.

T.M. Jacob, Minister for Water Resources, said that Tamil Nadu was illegally diverting one TMC water that rightly belonged to Kerala. It has also been found that farmers in Tamil Nadu were engaged in making use of Kerala waters over a 5 km stretch from the Moolathara Regulator to the Manakkadavu Weir.

The Government of Tamil Nadu had given the assurance that all unauthorised pump sets installed by farmers from that State would soon be removed.

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