Assam: After protests, High Court puts Amchang Sanctuary eviction drive on hold for a day

Additional Advocate General Devajit Saikia, appearing for Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal, requested Chief Justice Ajit Singh on Wednesday to allow the government suspend the eviction drive. The Chief Justice acceded to the request but directed to continue the same against commercial establishments. a government press release said.

“The Additional Advocate General informed the High Court that as school examinations are going on and winter is intensifying, the government had to think over the eviction drive. The CM is also considering the issue of rehabilitation of the evicted people and finalisation of modalities for this would take some time,” a government press release said.

Sonowal’s BJP-led government has come under severe attack from various quarters for launching the eviction drive – which has been done following a HC order – with groups accusing him of going back on his election promise of protecting “jaati-maati-bheti” (identity, land and homesteads) of the indigenous communities.

State forest and environment minister Pramila Rani Brahma blamed the previous Congress government of Tarun Gogoi for encouraging and allowing encroachment in the Amchang Wildlife Sanctuary. “While Amchang was declared as a Wildlife Sanctuary in 2004, most of the people had encroached it after 2005,” she said.

An eviction order was issued by the Gauhati HC while disposing off a suo moto PIL registered in 2013 on the basis of a letter written by Early Birds, a Guwahati-based environment protection group, giving details of how the sanctuary was rapidly shrinking because of failure of the authorities to protect it from systematic encroachment. An official estimate has put the number of encroachers at about 2,000.

Over 10 sq km of the 78.64-sq km Amchang Wilelife Sanctuary is currently under encroachment, with the people setting up about a dozen villages by cutting down trees and shrubs that provide shelter and food to several species of wildlife. Amchang is home to 44 species of mammals and 250 avian species, besides varied numbers of reptiles and amphibians.