TN: AIKS protests evictions in Meghamalai-Varusanadu area
The All India Kisan Sabha (AIKS) has launched a sharp attack on the Tamil Nadu Government and forest bureaucracy over ongoing attempts to evict traditional forest dwellers from over 5,072 hectares of land in the Meghamalai-Varusanadu areas of Theni district. The peasant body termed the action a “systemic, deliberate violation of the law” that severely mutilates the Forest Rights Act (FRA) in both letter and spirit.
According to the farmers’ union, around 25,000 people — mostly marginal peasants, Adivasis, Dalits, and Most Backward Classes spread across nine village panchayats — are currently facing eviction in the terrain, which forms part of the Agasthyamalai Biosphere Reserve (ABR). AIKS alleged that the State Forest Department is deploying underhanded tactics by wrongfully branding long-term cultivating peasants as “encroachers”. Detailing the history of the region, the farmers’ union highlighted that revenue records, Zamin documents, historical maps, and census data conclusively demonstrate that these communities were residing and farming on the land well before it was declared a Reserve Forest and Wildlife Sanctuary.
Speaking on the unlawful measures employed by authorities, AIKS President Ashok Dhawale condemned the bureaucracy’s total disregard for statutory procedures. “The Forest Rights Act explicitly prohibits the eviction or removal of forest dwellers from forest land under their occupation until the recognition and verification procedure is complete,” Dhawale said. “The Tamil Nadu forest bureaucracy, hand in glove with the elite conservation industry, has a notorious track record in violating the FRA and manipulating laws to suppress Adivasis and traditional forest dwellers.”
The organisation further stressed that the executive is undermining the authority of the Gram Sabha — a statutory body under the FRA — while systematically violating both the FRA and the Wildlife Protection Act (WLPA) to set up Tiger Reserves across the region, including areas surrounding the Srivilliputhur-Megamalai and Kalakad-Mundanthurai Tiger Reserves.
Calling out institutional failure, AIKS General Secretary Vijoo Krishnan expressed grave concern over the role of the judiciary in such disputes. “What is most disturbing is that in several cases related to the FRA and WLPA, a section of the judiciary is eager to whitewash and justify serious violations and excesses committed by the forest bureaucracy,” Krishnan stated. “The esteemed higher courts should be guided by constitutional morality and not by the colonial legacy of forest governance. It is a patriotic duty to prevent the sabotage of the FRA, as any violation directly creates a conducive atmosphere for crony capitalists to loot natural resources.”
Demanding immediate intervention, the AIKS called upon the Tamil Nadu State Government to strictly implement the FRA in the region and urged the Supreme Court to uphold the legislation in its true spirit, appealing to all democratic sections to resist the ongoing eviction drives.