The latest of the 14 encroachers’ group gather around a burning log to ward of the November chill. ‘We have paid Rs. 1000 for an acre to the organizers who allotted us land here and 560 of us have registered. Since the other tribes have come and settled down we must also have a share of the land,’ they said.
Photographs and Captions by : Sayantan Bera
Children carry water to their homes inside the Intanki national park.
Photographs and Captions by: Sayantan Bera
According to Liangsi Niumai, an environment activist, ‘the encroachers have a lot of political clout and most are rich government officials with teak plantations around the park area. They employ the poor and landless as mere caretakers of the encroached land.’
Photographs and Captions by: Sayantan Bera
Armed poachers in bikes and not forest guards are more visible inside the Intanki National Park in Nagaland. Over the past 20 years one-fourth of the 202 square km park has been occupied by different groups of encroachers.
Photographs and Captions by: Sayantan Bera
Patches of land, with chopped tree trunks jutting out is a common sight inside Intanki. The long drawn conflict between the Indian state and the warring underground factions and the rivalry for cultivable land and forest resources between competing Naga tribes has lead to a slow decimation of the park area
Photographs and Captions by: Sayantan Bera
The church and community halls look frugal and makeshift but serve a purpose: no one will touch a place of worship in case of an eviction drive.
Photographs and Captions by: Sayantan Bera
Little Gigi and his brother would visit the zoo in Dimapur soon to see the rare gibbons and the clouded leopard. That zoo was once the Rangapahar Reserve forest, over 90 percent of which was lost to encroachment. A fate which now seems imminent for the Intanki National Park.
Photographs and Captions by: Sayantan Bera
60-year-old Khamcha Sumi came to Intanki with his fellow tribesmen way back in 1994, from Dimapur. The proximity of Intanki to the commercial town of Dimapur and the greed for more cultivable land in a state with agriculture as its mainstay has played a role behind the series of encroachments.
Photographs and Captions by: Sayantan Bera
Habitat of the rare western hoolock gibbon, the famed hornbill and the ‘not-seen-in-years’ clouded leopard, Intanki is now home to 14 encroaching groups. In the free passage of Intanki they indulge in poaching of rare fauna including migratory birds, clearing forests for cultivation and commercial timber felling.
Photographs and Captions by: Sayantan Bera
A board in the chief wildlife warden’s office play host to the rich fauna of Intanki.
Photographs and Captions by: Sayantan Bera