Although the primary duty of a forest officer is to preserve the forest in his or her jurisdiction and prevent illegal activities like smuggling, a forest officer here has been left scot-free despite having neglected his duty.
This has come to light recently when Pramod Kumar Sethy, Range Officer, wrote a letter to the DFO Keonjhar against his sub- ordinate Pitambar Naik ,Deputy Ranger, for cutting of 15 valuable standing sal trees from Kalapat reserve forest of Podanga beat under Telkoi range.
Naik was in charge of Telkoi forest range from March 2018 to September,2019 before Sethy who joined on October 1, 2019. In the month of March , Rs 1 lakh had been allocated in the name of Pitambar to collect 30 metres of dry sal log equivalent to 15 uprooted trees and hand over the same to the OFDC. But it is alleged that instead of depositing the wood with the corporation ,it was smuggled out to some other party. When there was delay in receiving the materials , the OFDC sought to know it. Pitambar in order to tide over the situation, cut down 15 valuable standing sal trees and made 90 logs . After some days ,as per his plan ,he would have despatched the logs but in the meanwhile, Sethy took over the charge and he immediately brought the irregularities to the notice of the DFO, Keonjhar. However, no action was taken against Pitamber ever since.When contacted, DFO Santosh Kumar Joshi told that he is aware of the issue and the matter is under inquiry.