Youth Club urges
Source: The Sangai Express
Imphal, April 19 2023:
Decent Youths' Club, Khanarok has strongly condemned the alleged continued practice of deforestation and setting up settlements in some portions of Waithou Ching Protected Forest and urged the State Government to monitor the situation.
Y Abung Khuman, president, Decent Youths' Club made the appeal during a press conference held at the office of the Club located at Khanarok this afternoon.
He stated that volunteers of the Club had found evidence of the aforementioned practice during a visit to inspect the state of the forest today.
During the inspection visit, the volunteers reportedly discovered new settlements consisting of a few houses at 'Yerumbi Ching', which is a part of Waithou Ching Protected Forest.
He added that they also found some hills had been levelled to prepare the ground for construction of more houses.
The youth club president further shared that Waithou Ching had been recognized as 'Protected Forest' according to a notification issued by the Government of Manipur, Secretariat - Forest Branch in the State Gazette on June 3, 1966.Further he said that the residents of Khanarok had preserved and safeguarded the Waithou Ching Protected Forest which is part of Waithou Hill Range for many years.
However, since the last few years, the villagers of Phunal Maring Village have cut down the trees of this forest and built settlements as well as other structures, he claimed.
He also accused the villagers of using the forest land as per their whims.
When an appeal was made to the DFO of Thoubal regarding the matter, the department prohibited the villagers of Phunal Maring from building new houses.
The Deputy Commissioner of Imphal East also assured that relevant officials had been instructed to look into the situation.
As such, Y Abung Khuman appealed to the Chief Minister to take up concrete steps to safeguard forests in view of mass deforestation and settlement in forest areas which has subsequently impacted the climatic conditions and led to water shortage.