In April 2017, forest ranger Sanjay Dutta was made in charge of a special task force that aimed to protect eight districts of north Bengal, where the wildlife was particularly vulnerable to poachers. Already well known in the environmentalists’ circles — he received the prestigious Clark R Bavin Wildlife Law Enforcement Award handed out by the Animal Welfare Institute in Johannesburg, in 2016 — Dutta’s brief, as before, was to stop rampant smuggling of rare wildlife like pangolins, and animal products like ivory, in the Belacoba range in Jalpaiguri district.
The 42-year-old had, by then, already made scores of arrests and seized smuggled goods. The locals even had a nickname for him: “Forest Singham” (lion of the forest).
In the past two weeks, however, Dutta has been busy with something else. With the state government turning down the Centre’s request to allow tea gardens to resume operations, the nearly 283 tea gardens in north Bengal remain under lockdown; most of the 350,000 permanent and casual workers are staring at an impending shortage of food and supplies, and money.
Familiar with the area, Dutta has already identified the out of reach spots where tea garden workers have settled, and where local non governmental organisations involved in helping the underprivileged during this lockdown, have not been able to reach. Together with members of his forest department team, he has distributed dry ration and cooked food for thousands of residents in villages and colonies of tea estate workers.
Till Tuesday, they had distributed dry rations — 10 kg rice, 500 gram dal, two kg potato and 250 grams soybean — to around 1700 people, and cooked food for more than 3600 people, Dutta said. He also added that he has budgeted Rs 4 lakh of his money for these expenses.
{{/usCountry}}Till Tuesday, they had distributed dry rations — 10 kg rice, 500 gram dal, two kg potato and 250 grams soybean — to around 1700 people, and cooked food for more than 3600 people, Dutta said. He also added that he has budgeted Rs 4 lakh of his money for these expenses.
{{/usCountry}}Even joint forest management committees — agencies formed by a cluster of villages living close to a reserved forest and registered with the territorial divisional forest office — have come forward with funds. The money raised by at least 20 such committees, made up of villagers and tribal families, was used to distribute 15 to 25 kg rice each among 3000 families living in villages located in remote forest areas, Dutta said.
“With Dutta around, we now know that not only forests but even the people who live there are safe,” said Tula Mohammed, president of Hiramari joint forest management committee.