Encroachers have become deeply entrenched in and around Munnar in Idukki district.
They have taken possession of land vested with the government under the Kannan Devan Hills (Resumption of Lands) Act and cardamom hill reserves leased by government besides land owned by the State Electricity Board and public sector units.
The failure of the Munnar mission of Chief Minister V. S. Achuthanandan two years ago had multiple effects. It emboldened the encroachers. At least 600 acres of government land had been encroached upon after the Chief Minister withdrew his team from Munnar. New roads are being constructed through cardamom estates and wooded government lands with immunity. Old ones are being improved upon. Existing encroachments are also being enlarged upon by annexing nearby government land. Encroachments are also taking place at Vagamon in the district.
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In Devikulam taluk, in which Munnar falls, even village boundaries are being re-drawn to aid the encroachers. Most have encroachers have fabricated documents. Falsification of documents, forgery, alteration of government records and maps and false statements and applications to obtain titles are common. In places near Lakshmi estate, there exists large wooded areas with resorts which are claimed to be neither cardamom estates nor forests. Several holdings extend beyond the limits prescribed under the Land Reforms Act. Yet, the government has not taken a single step to take over the land. Some of these areas actually need to be notified as forests.
Rules applicable to cardamom reserves are being violated when it comes to conversion of cardamom lands and construction of buildings. The government has always turned a Nelson’s eye to these developments. Recently, the Central Narcotics Enforcement Squad had detected ganja cultivation on government land leased for cardamom cultivation atAluvinthan and Njandarmedu in the periphery of Mathikettan National Park. Though some forest officials had been suspended in this connection, the government failed to cancel the lease and take over even that land.
Following depletion of water sources, many cardamom estates have constructed check dams in the estates in recent years. The pros and cons of these works are debatable and no regulation is being applied to these constructions. The latest trend is to build check dams for tourism purposes, and at least a few of these check dams can be termed as small dams. The check dams of the Kannan Devan Hill Plantation Company, which the government propose to demolish, is only the latest of such constructions in the district. The increasing number of dams in the district can become a safety issue in the near future.
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If the main encroachers till recently were estate and resort owners, the poor too have stepped in now with political backing from local units of the CPI (M) and CPI. They are also being used a cover for encroachments by bigwigs. Some are being used for grabbing land systematically. The land finally ends up in the hands of influential people and resorts.
After his initial enthusiasm to evict the resort owners, the Chief Minister had tuned in to the political rhetoric for assignment of land to the poor. This was why the move by Forest Minister Benoy Viswam for notification of more than 17000 acres of forests in the possession of the Forest Department in the KDH village as reserve forest got stalled twice at the Cabinet level. Notification could have meant that the land could no more be assigned either to the encroachers or to poor eligible families. The collector’s report citing difficulties in demarcating the land serve as a cover for a political decision.
In fact, the Chief Minister’s mission helped the encroachers to identify suitable government land for encroachment. Surveys demarcated government lands which were thought to be part of estates. During the mission, boards had been put up identifying government land. These have now been removed and encroachers have grabbed the land. The same thing happened in much of land proposed to be handed over to the Forest Department including those allocated for eucalyptus cultivation by the Hindustan Newsprint Limited at Chinnakanal. Large areas of forest and revenue land in the catchment areas of the Anayirankal dam is in the hands of encroachers now.
With the failure of the Munnar mission, government’s writ no more runs in Munnar and surrounding areas in respect of constructions, land transactions, building of roads, power and water supply and even law and order. Traditionally, government officers posted to Munnar were subservient to estate owners for a variety of reasons. (They were often dependent on estate owners even for their accommodation.) Now, even a semblance of government power is not visible when it comes to encroachments. The only solace is that despite development of tourism and absence of governance, criminal gangs have not yet started operating in Munnar and its surroundings.