Gurgaon: Nearly one acre of encroached land was cleared in Anangpur on Tuesday, less than a week after two forest officials were allegedly assaulted by a group of people while attempting to stop illegal construction at the same site. The land is protected under special orders of Section 4 of the Punjab Land Preservation Act (PLPA).The demolition was carried out by the forest department with police protection on the land that falls under the Supreme Court’s July 2022 judgment, which held that all land covered by special orders must be treated as forest irrespective of ownership.Faridabad DFO Jhalkar Uyake told TOI, “The encroachment covered less than one acre of forest land. When our team tried to stop the illegal construction, it was attacked and an FIR was registered. We demolished the encroachment on Tuesday and will continue taking action against encroachments in the Aravalis.” According to the department, the officials were assaulted, their uniforms were torn and they were forced to retreat. The FIR was registered under sections 121(1), 132, 221, 223(a), 3(5) and 351(3) of the BNS.The episode once again highlighted the challenges of protecting the ecologically sensitive Aravalis in Faridabad, where enforcement is being carried out with a severely depleted frontline workforce. Department records show that the Faridabad forest division has only eight forest guards against 62 sanctioned posts, leaving 54 vacancies. Officials earlier told TOI that Anangpur currently has no forest guards posted, forcing foresters and senior officers to respond to complaints of encroachment and illegal construction.The encroachment was removed from land covered under the special PLPA notification, which has remained at the centre of prolonged legal disputes over privately owned forest land in the Aravalis. While much of the land is privately owned, Supreme Court has ruled that its legal status as forest remains unchanged if it falls under the special order of Section 4 notifications or otherwise qualifies as forest.The demolition also comes as the Supreme Court-appointed central empowered committee is overseeing a fresh khasra-wise survey of protected land in Anangpur after discrepancies were found between official records and the extent of forest land on the ground. The exercise is expected to determine the legal status of thousands of structures in the village.
