Security base camps in Dudejhari
KAILALI: The local administration set up temporary base camps of Armed Police Force (APF) and Nepal Police in Dudejhari forest area after the UCPN-Maoist aligned 'squatters' warned that they would go ahead with the encroachment again.
According to Mukunda Thapa, DIG, Baidyanath Battalion of APF at Attariya, about 400 police personnel have been stationed in the camps. "We decided to deploy the security personnel so as to prevent any untoward incident though no encroachers are in the forest area now."
The base camps have been set up in the encroached forest land where the Maoist-backed people had erected their makeshift huts overnight. A team comprising Kailali CDO Hari Krishna Poudel and high level security officials reached the forest area today morning to take stock of the situation.
The arrangement is believed to have prompted by the warning by Naresh Shahi, chairman of All Nepal Farmers' Association, who had threatened to recapture the forest. He had told so at a press meet in Lamki yesterday.
CDO Poudel informed the forest area was under the control of security personnel.
He also informed that there was no presence of squatters though they claimed that they would seize the forest again.
Maoist cadres and encroachers took out a funeral rally carrying bodies of two of the deceased -- Sanjaya Dhakal and Narendra BK -- in Lamki today. The Maoists' body informed that they buried the bodies in the same place where they had clashed with the police.
Speaking at a corner meet organised after the procession, Shahi claimed that the forest area was still under their control and they would settle the squatters in the forest land at any cost.
Normal life in the district was badly affected due to the bandh today as well. The Maoist cadres only allowed plying motorcycles in the area today.
Meanwhile, local chapter of Chamber of Commerce and Industries (CCI) here in Kailali began initiatives to solve the problem. An all-party meeting held in the office hall today decided to resume the vehicles from 5 pm today to 5 am tomorrow.
Report blames cops for deaths
Kathmandu: A field report of Campaign for Human Rights and Social Transformation revealed here today that the police had fired indiscriminately on the squatters at Dudejhari in Kailali without a prior warning.
The report stated that the squatters were occupying the open spaces of the forest just to exert pressure on the government to provide land. The squatters had cut no trees there but were using the open spaces to make temporary huts, the report added. "Police raped women and some children were burnt alive," said Bishnu Pokhrel a member of the team at a press conference.
Jhapat Bahadur BK, an injured claimed that they were forced to retaliate with lathis as the police fired tear gas and then bullets without any warning. "They had shot women saying that they would give birth to Maoists," he said adding that the squatters, flood victims and liberated bonded labourers had gathered there just to create pressure on the government.
Bishnu Pukar Shrestha, president of the human rights body, said that the incident was a gross violation of human rights. He demanded appropriate compensation to those killed in the incident, free medical treatment to those injured and a high-level probe committee to investigate into the incident and punish the guilty.
"The government should provide the squatters food, shelter and clothes as guaranteed by the Interim Constitution," he said. --HNS
