50 villagers surrender and confess to cutting trees

50 villagers surrender and confess to cutting trees

Mangalore Today News Network

Kundapur, Jul 17, 2012 : Around 50 villagers who felled trees in Mudur 10 days back to express their anger against the district administration surrendered before the Kollur police on July 16, Monday.

The Kollur police then produced them in Kundapur court, which released them on conditional bail.

On July 7, Saturday, the local people, who were frustrated over the failure of the authorities to widen the Jadkal to Mudur road, cut down over 150 trees causing a total loss of Rs. 50 lakh. A furious DC Dr. M. T. Reju visited the place and said that the trees will not be cleared till the culprits surrender.

The government had sanctioned Rs. 2 crore for the construction of the Jadkal to Mudur road, about 8kms long. The forest officers did not permit the cutting of trees on either side of these roads, owing to which the road could not be widened. The local people, therefore, cut down the trees on their own, as a result of which there were power cuts and communication problems.

The DC’s demand that 400 people must surrender before the police made the local people angrier, and finally, 50 of them arrived at the police station and pleaded guilty.

Finally, MLA K. Laxminarayan and members of the GP, ZP, and TP discussed the issue with the forest department and solved it amicably.