THE Ministry of Environment and Forests declared on February 15 the 9,145 acres of land at Arankhola Mouja in Modhupur Garh of Tangail district as a reserve forest under Section 20 of the Forest Act of 1927. Following the Gazette Notification fear of eviction spread among the Garo, Koch, Borman and other ethnic minorities and Bangalee people living in the area. Around 15 villages are situated in the Arankhola Mouja area. The villagers claim that the lands where the villages are located are their ancestral property.
Reports published in the media on Saturday described that a rally was jointly organised by Garo Students Union and Modhupur Garo Society on Friday at Garia of Tangail in protest of publishing the Gazette Notification that declared 9,145 acres of land as a reserve forest. Addressing the rally as Chief Guest Parbattya Chattagram Jana Sanghati Samity leader Jyotirindra Bodhopriya Larma, popularly known as Santu Larma, criticised the government saying the present government is not friendly towards the ethnic minority people.
He alleged that the 30 lakh people of the ethnic minority communities in the country are now deprived and tortured in various ways. In the last 45 years, none of the governments solved their problems. Insisting that the ethnic minority people will have to remain united to protect their existence he added, “We will have to have our own leadership, our own party to realise our rights. We cannot depend on any other parties to do that for us.” The ethnic minority people of Modhupur said, even though the gazette did not mention their eviction, but they fear that they might be evicted eventually and expressed their determination to resist the alleged conspiracy of evicting the ethnic minority people from Modhupur in name of the reserve forest at any cost.
Modhupur Garh is known as a deep-forest area of Bangladesh. At the same time this is an area populated with ethnic minorities. Tribal people of Bangladesh, both in plain land and hilly areas, are forest friendly. They feel comfort in residing near forests, and their livelihood depends primarily on forests. For this dependence they remain alert not to do any major harm to forest areas, as it would effect adversely in their life pattern.
It is a reality that since long the existence of ethnic minority people in or near the forest areas have not created any harm to the environment or disrupted the ecological balance. It is the penetration of so-called civilised powerful persons, that caused the real damage. So, if the authority is sincere to protect forest, interference from outside should be stopped. Eviction of ethnic minorities in the name of declaring reserve forest is not the solution; rather it will create confusion and will disrupt peace. Modhupur is a peaceful zone. But tension is being created there among the ethnic minority people. Bangladesh is now passing through a difficult time. In this circumstances if hue and cry starts on the issue of ethnic minority oppression then tensions will deepen. Of course trees are valuable. But human life is more valuable than trees.
