Nepalgunj, March 4 Over a dozen trees have been felled illegally inside the Banke National Park in the last one month. It is learnt that some of the chopped trees have already been smuggled out of the national park. Interestingly, neither the national park staffers, nor the army deployed in the park have taken notice of the illegal activity. According to the locals, the trees were felled in the area near Banke’s Dhakeri along the east-west highway. Forest guard Jaya Bahadur Khadka said, “The smugglers might have felled the trees in the night. On January 3, only three trees had been felled. A month later, we found over a dozen trees felled in the area,” he said. However, locals said they suspected of collusion between the national park officials and the buffer zone forest users’ group. “After the trees were felled, staffers of the national park visited the area for investigation, but no action has been taken so far,” said a local. Nirmala Bista, a local forest user of Mahadevpuri expressed surprise at the illegal felling of trees in the national park area, saying, “We don’t break even a twig ourselves and we find that over a dozen trees have been felled illegally.” Interestingly, the area is only two kilometres from the Mahadevpuri post of the Nepali Army. On his part, Jhijhari Buffer Zone community forest users’ group chairperson Pahal Bahadur Khatri said the illegal felling of trees had drawn their attention. “I don’t think the villagers did it. It must be the outsiders,” he said. Community Forest Users’ Federation Banke chairperson Dilli Giri said he smelled a rat behind the mysterious silence of the national park authorities. “Their silence has raised suspicion,” said Giri. Chief conservation officer at the park Lal Bahadur Bhandari said they were still investigating the matter. “A probe committee has been formed under the coordination of the assistant conservation officer Rabin Chaudhary to investigate the matter,” said Bhandari. On his part, Deputy Director General of National Park Department, Gopal Prasad Bhattarai, said the national park and the local forest users were responsible for the protection of the forest. He urged them to coordinate and cooperate for the protection of the forest.