Jammu and Kashmir government started a massive encroachment drive. Then it remembered forest rights
An orchard owner in Budgam's Kani Dajan village surveys the damage. | Safwat Zargar Mohammad Ahsan Wagay does not remember which day it happened. His memory is blurred by the shock. Sometime in the third week of November, a team of forest department officials arrived at Kani Dajan village in Central Kashmir’s Budgam district. They left behind a trial of destruction, cutting down hundreds of apple trees and damaging other crops on forest land occupied by village residents. Wagay’s orchard was also flattened. “They axed around 200 of my apple trees,” he said. “They ...
Source: scroll.in