| Staff REPORTER |
ITANAGAR, Jul 4: The ‘Aboriginal Tribal Inhabitant Villagers of Itanagar Capital Region’ (ATIVICR) has sought de-reservation of the Itanagar Wildlife Sanctuary (IWS). It claimed that the Forest Department has wrongfully included Itanagar Capital Region and several notified villages as wildlife sanctuary areas.
“We had donated our community land for establishing the Capital with good faith. However, we only recently came to know about it being under the Wildlife Sanctuary when Capital DC Talo Potom issued a ‘notice’ for cancelation of land allotment in the capital region, saying that maximum part of Itanagar Capital Region comes under Itanagar Wildlife Sanctuary,” ATIVICR chairman Techi Toka said at a press conference here today.
He expressed shock over the revelation. “We made enquiries about the matter and found that there was a notification from the Forest department in 1978 identifying the capital region as IWS,” he said, adding that there were no consultations on the matter with the local public.
ATIVICR general secretary Nera Techi said that the Forest Department has now proposed a rationalization map of the IWS which excludes an area of 74.454 sq km out of the 140 sq km of IWS, which he said ATIVICR is not happy with. “With 65.346 sq km as the existing area of IWS, it also proposed acquisition of 105.040 sq km as additional area out of which an area of 72.414 sq km would be earmarked as eco-sensitive zone (ESZ),” he lamented.
He said that the proposed rationalization map is unacceptable to the indigenous populace. “We demand for complete de-reservation of the entire IWS which has been wrongfully mapped by the then DC Lower Subansiri district and the Forest Department without consent of the local people during 1976-78,” he added.
He sought to know if ICR comes under Wildlife Sanctuary then how come the state government is constructing huge government projects, numerous buildings and hospitals for the last 40-45 years.
The ATIVICR has warned of launching democratic movement provided the state government failed to fulfill its demand.