The Tengragiri reserved forest, the coastal belt's shield against cyclones and storm surges from the Bay of Bengal, is being stripped of its trees. According to local residents and environmental campaigners, in the four days from 12 September to Wednesday 16 September, a gang cut around 900 trees from Tengragiri and from the Nalbunia forest beside Shuvo Sandhya sea beach, about two kilometres to the north. Some 400 trees were felled in Tengragiri and about 500 in the Shuvo Sandhya area; the species taken include rain tree, keora, gewa, jhau and jilapi.

Tengragiri lies in Sonakata union of Taltali upazila in Barguna and covers 13,644 acres by the Forest Department's own count. The area was once part of the Sundarbans; it was declared a reserved forest on 12 July 1960 and named Tengragiri in 1967. Its principal trees include gewa, jam, dhundul, keora, sundari, bain, karamcha, tal, kankra, bankathal, hetal and goran, and it is home to monkeys, porcupines, wild boar, turtles, jackals, jungle fowl and 40 species of snake.

Residents say the gang usually moves the timber out at night. Often the trees are felled and left inside the forest to be carried away at a convenient time, and the stumps are uprooted to erase the evidence. Local residents Md. Rifat, Babul Howlader and others said that anyone who speaks up is threatened by Forest Department officials with a tree-felling case of their own, so they watch the forest being cleared in front of them without daring to protest.

Dr. Kamruzzaman Bachchu, chairman of Sonakata union parishad, placed the blame directly on the department. Speaking on Thursday evening, he said: 'Forest Department people are involved in the tree cutting. If they were not involved, how could the thieves sit and cut trees for so long without any action being taken?' He demanded that those involved be brought to trial. Md. Shawon, the department's Nalbunia beat officer, said he knew nothing about the felling and declined to say more.

Arifur Rahman, coordinator of the Taltali branch of the environmental group Dharitri Rokkhay Amra (DHORA), said the group had received reports of more than 900 trees being cut from the two forests in four days. The forest, he said, protects people as a natural barrier against cyclones, tidal surges and strong winds; if the clearing continues, the ecological balance will be lost and the coastal settlements will face greater disaster risk. The group has also received complaints of crabs, monitor lizards and wild boar being hunted in the forest while the department stays silent.

Md. Ziaul Islam, the Forest Department's Taltali range officer, said an on-site inspection after the complaint had confirmed illegal felling and a case had been filed. On 14 September the upazila nirbahi officer of Taltali, Atish Sarker, formed a five-member inquiry committee headed by upazila agriculture officer Abu Zafar Mohammad Elias. The convener said he received the committee's letter on Thursday and would begin the inquiry next week; the UNO said legal action would follow once the report is in.

For the farming and fishing communities of this coast the forest is the first line of defence against the sea, and campaigners warn that every thinning of it raises the risk of the next storm. What happens next now rests on the inquiry committee's report. The story was reported by Samakal's Amtali (Barguna) correspondent.

Source: Samakal