BANGALORE: Justice N K Patil has directed forest officials to submit their report in writing and file an affidavit to Member Secretary, Legal Department, High Court, within 15 days.Speaking at a Lok Adalat held on Saturday, Justice Patil took cognizance of negligence in the department’s functioning and issued directives seeking a report from the forest officials about the action taken and their further course of action. In addition, the Forest Department has also been asked to prepare and submit their Environment Audit Report within three months.Justice Patil pulled up the forest officials as they were not able to give a valid explanation to the queries. “Despite the implementation of Mining Act, the mining activity is still prevalent in the State,” said. After a presentation, when Srikant V Hosur, Conservator of Forest (Forest Conservation) was asked how many illegal mining cases have been reported by the department till date, he was speechless.The justice said, “About 15 cases of illegal mining have come up to Lok Adalat. The Forest Department has not taken up any step to stop mining activities.” He also pointed at the weakness of the Forest Legal section. “Of the 70,000 cases till date booked for forest offence, only about 2,500 cases are with the court, so what about the other cases?” he questioned. “Providing natural rights like oxygen and water to the people is the duty of the forest officials.” he added.Dr Swaminath M H, Additional Principal Chief Conservator of Forests (Wildlife) brought out the fact about problem related to containing man-animal conflict at Alur, Hassan. He said, “There are about 25-30 elephants in the area, we tried to translocate about two male elephants to Nagarhole, but they have come back.” Pointing out to other options he said, “Removing the coffee plantation around Hemavathy Reservoir and developing elephant corridor is one option, but this would be a costly affair .” Further, the lack of adequate forests guards was another of their problem. “Of the 2,893 forest beats, one forest guard is in charge of about 14.99 sq kms. As per the requirement, there should be one forest guard to handle six sq kms.” Justice Patil and Yellapa Reddy, Member, Lok Adalat, discussed various issues including the lack of coordination among the forest officials, State Biodiversity Board and AYUSH Department (in case of medicinal plants).
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