Was Someone in Assam Listening?

Assam:   It was a bone jarring 15 hour trip from Demow, Sivsagar District, East of the Kaziranga Nat'l Park, to Guwahati along the ‘Golden Highway’ aka ‘King’s Highway (depending on to whom you’re talking). Part well constructed highway;  poorly engineered highway; washed out highway, and plain off-roading, it is the life line that runs laterally through Upper and Lower Assam. Thereafter, one can reach Siliguri, gateway of the NE and mainland India. Mid-way- at a well earned tiffin stop- Peerless Green Initiaitves Director Frank Costanzo sat with his hosts for tea and respite.  It was November 2009, and Frank was being escorted by his hosts to assess feasibility of a commercial scale bamboo based forest-perma-culture. Always famous for saying what other’s only think about saying, Frank gazed out to the road at the omni-present AK-47 brandishing IA soldiers milling about in the afternoon sun.


“If you want to develop this State and not just occupy it, you can begin with those GI’s putting away the military hardware in favor of civil hardware.”

Frank’s hosts were a mix of local leaders and Delhi policy-wonks and they sat motionless at Frank’s frankness.

“I mean, look at them, they’re bored witless. You give those and the rest of your army a shovel to fix Assam’s roads or plant a tree and you’ll find the gun no longer necessary.”

Frank’s hosts turned their eyes to the sentries; the silence broken by one wonk’s reply, “Yes, it is complicated and must change.” The Assamese ethnic-Tai member of the group, said nothing but wore a wry look of pleasure at the notion and the discomfort it had created.

Maybe someone was listening?.... See below:

Charge of the Green Brigade in Assam
Sept 27, 2011
Naresh Mitra
TNN
Bishmuri (Kokrajhar): On a hot Friday afternoon, Colonel Naveen Sharma and a clutch of jawans troop into Owaguri, a nondescript village on the fringes of the Chirang Reserve Forest in Kokrajhar district of western Assam. The villagers, spending a lazy afternoon chatting under the shade of a tree, remain unfazed by the sudden appearance of the uniformed men.

The Owaguri villagers warmly receive the colonel and his men, quickly arrange for comfortable seats and the women offer cool water to the profusely-sweating jawans.

Sharma is here to find out why Owaguri residents aren’t participating in the area’s reforestation. “We’ve been busy tending to the paddy crop in our fields. Once we are done, we’ll join the plantation work,” villager Mangal Narzary explains. Following the assurance, Sharma leaves the hamlet to inspect the progress of sapling plantation at Jharbari block.

He reaches the forest fringes. About 130 Bodo men and women are clearing weeds and digging pits to plant saplings at Jharbari and other severely-deforested reserved forest patches.

He spots many Army men toiling with the villagers, also guarding them from insurgents. In April this year, National Democratic Front of Boroland’s (NDFB) anti-talks faction gunned down eight BSF men at Ultapani, barely 10km from where the plantation work is on.

The plantation effort at Jharbari is part of the 135 Infantry Battalion of Territorial Army’s — also known as 135 Eco Task Force (ETF) — twopronged war in Assam’s Kokrajhar. Apart from rejuvenating the forest, Sharma as commanding officer, ETF, is trying to stop the timber mafia from mowing down the woods.

“We are waging a war against destruction of forests,” Sharma says. The Chirang Reserve Forest, which spills over into Bhutan, has lost nearly 30,000 ha green cover of its 59,526 ha spread, in almost two decades of insurgency in Kokrajhar district.

Sharma’s task force consists of 275 ex-servicemen, Bodoland Territorial Areas District (BTAD) forest department personnel and locals.

Since the 135 ETF was raised, 24 sq km of the deforested Chirang reserve has been reforested. About 2 million saplings have been planted since the battalion began field work in 2008.

Livelihood incentives offered by the task force inspired people to undertake afforestation and help rid the reserve of encroachers. Daily wages offered for the job helped drive the villagers.

“Earlier, we had to fell trees and sell the timber for a living. Now we earn our living by planting trees,” Chingring Narzary of Mainapur village says. She is one among many women planting saplings at Jharbari. Each such person earns Rs 120 a day for the job. Last year, the task force ensured daily work and income for villagers.

This year, the Power Grid is funding the plantation drive. “The labourers’ wages are coming from Power Grid,” Lieutenant Colonel S S Dagar, ETF project officer, says.







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