DIMAPUR, NOVEMBER 30 (MExN): The United Naga Tribes Association of Border Areas (UNTABA) today stated that the present eviction drive undertaken by the authorities under Karbi-Anglong District by the Assam Government particularly in the Daldali Reserve Forest in the Lahorijan sector is “too little and too late.” A press note from the UNTABA alleged that the initiative is “driven by ulterior motive based on the inter-personal rivalries between the powers that be from Assam.” “It is nothing but a mere eye-wash on the bigger lapses on the part of Assam Government over its illegal occupation and random exploitations of thousands of square miles on the rich and fertile Reserve Forests areas of the Naga people inside Assam,” it said. If the Assam Government is really sincere, the UNTABA said it must “undertake eviction drive in all these Reserve Forests areas without any hesitation covering all the areas without being selective as per the Provisions contained in the Reserve Forests Acts on the following Reserve Forests making the cut-off mark from 1860 onwards when the then Assam Tea Company was first established and tea gardens and industries were established in the Naga lands.” The association listed the reserved forest areas as Langting Mupa, Krungming, Nambor, Upper Daigurung, Lower Daigurung, Kaliani, Mikir, Diphu, Rengma Reserve Forest, Daldali, Dhansiri Reserve Forest, Lumding, Desema, Kaki, Geleki, Tiru, Kakodanga, Desoi (Tsurang) Valley, Desoi, and Doyang. “All these Reserve Forests areas rightfully belong to Naga people,” the UNTABA stated, and argued that the Government of Assam and the Government of India “can never ever compensate the Naga people over its illegal occupations, random destructions and exploitations of these fertile and rich areas and for allowing random settlements of the people of illegal immigrants and labor tribes from central India over these lands…” “History will never forgive nor can it be re-written,” it added.
