Forest staffers helpless against offenders
A group led by a forest offender allegedly took away illegally extracted sand seized by the forest department from the reserve forest in Cox's Bazar's Chakaria upazila by attacking and threatening the department's staffers at gunpoint.
The incident took place after the local administration auctioned off the sand seized by the forest department to one Saiful Alam. Powered by the auction paper, Saiful's men are not only threatening forest staffers in the Dolahazara area, they are also using firearms to scare them away.
The forest department has seized around 8,97,000 cubic feet of sand at Dulahazara union of Chakaria upazila since May after a High Court bench came up with the order to scrap the lease of the canals.
The sand was stored in the Dulahazara reserve forest for the last three months under the supervision of the forest department.
As per the documents obtained by this newspaper, one of the miners, named Saiful Alam -- accused in forest cases over his involvement in sand mining -- filed a petition with the HC to have the seized sand released in August.
The HC directed the local administration to dispose of the matter on September 14 responding to the petition. Following that, Chakaria UNO allegedly auctioned off the sand to Saiful Islam at the end of September on the pretext of the court order.
On September 22, forest staffers came under attack and their vehicles were vandalised when they rushed to stop the miscreants in Dulahazara union on information that the sand was being transported away. A general diary was filed in this regard with Chakaria Police Station.
Chandan Kumar Chakrabarti, officer-in-charge of Chakaria Police Station, said a GD was filed with their station by the forest department. However, they could not identify the attackers.
"We are investigating to find out their identities," he said.
Prantosh Chandra Roy, assistant conservator of Cox's Bazar Forest Division (north), told The Daily Star that some canals were leased out for sand mining. However, the lessees extracted sand from the forest.
"Local administration auctioned off the sand seized by us without consulting the forest department. We urged them to demarcate the area between the forest and the canal before the auction but to no avail," he added.
On September 21, JP Dewan, upazila nirbahi officer of Chakaria, auctioned off the sand to Saiful Islam, who was sued several times by forest officials for his involvement in forest crimes.
Saiful on September 26 was sent to jail by the Cox's Bazar forest court.
Prantosh said there is no sand left in the canals auctioned by the local administration.
"Now Saiful's gang is claiming that the sand seized by the department was auctioned off to them. They are now threatening forest staffers. They also launched an armed attack on the staffers on September 22, vandalising their vehicles and injuring them," he added.
UNO Dewan said they auctioned off the sand mined from the leased area and not the sand stored by the forest department.
Asked if the area was demarcated before the auction, he did not reply.
Forest officials said though the miners got the lease of the canals, they trespassed into the reserve forest, razing a huge part of what is known as an important habitat for the critically endangered Asian Elephant.
This newspaper ran several reports during the middle of this year prompting green activists to file a petition seeking cancellation of the lease. Cox's Bazar deputy commissioner scrapped the lease of nine quarries in Chakaria following a High Court's order on May 25.
On July 8, this correspondent visited Paglirbil area. The mining left a trail of devastation turning the undergrowth vegetation in the forest, which once served as an ideal foraging spot for wildlife, particularly the herbivore elephant, into a huge lake encompassing an area of three kilometres.
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