Miscreants chop down 400 mango trees in Rajshahi at night
Miscreants have chopped down 400 mango trees owned by 15 farmers in Habaspur village of Rajshahi’s Bagha upazila on Sunday night.
Mango trees are common in Habaspur village, but trees those were chopped down were on low laying field where paddy was cultivated once.
A state of mourning has prevailed in the area since villagers noticed the fallen trees on Monday morning.
Visiting the area on Monday, tree owners were seeing carrying logs on van to home. One such owner is Prabir Sarkar. Miscreants cut down his 18-year-old 18 mango trees. “When I went to mango orchard, I found all trees chopped to the ground.”
Sixty-seven-year-old Nipendranath Paramanik was seeing carrying fallen tree branches on his bicycle. He said wiping his tears miscreants cut down 18 mango trees owned by his three brothers who have no enemies and these 17-year-old trees grew 4-5 maunds of mangos every year.
He said when he went to the field in the morning he found 18 trees falling on the wheat field. Police had come and recorded everything, but he cannot console himself in any way.
Miscreants also felled 15 mango trees of Sadhan Kumar Pramnik and 15 more trees of his younger brother Ripon. These trees were 17-year-old and grew about five mounds of mangos every year.
Fifty-five-year-old Abu Sama accompanied this correspondent to the mango orchards. Some trees were chopped down from roots and logs and tree branches were lying on the ground across 32 bighas of land.
Abu Sama sat next to a 180-year-old tree that was chopped down with a saw. Miscreants felled 28 of his mango trees. “A mango tree lives when you take its care as your child.”
He said miscreants also chopped down 20 of his mango trees at the same place 20 years ago and he is yet to get justice. The same happened and nobody can say anything.
Rupjan Begum’s mango orchard is next to Abu Sama’s one. She was seen wailing and running from one corner to another corner of the orchard.
Hearing the news of tree felling, a timber trader had come to Abu Saman to purchase the logs, but the farmer told the trader, “I will not be able to touch the trees today. Let the trees rain fallen on the ground.”
Local Monigram union parishad chairman Md Saiful Islam visited the mango orchards hearing the news of tree felling. “It is very tragic. We will try to identify the miscreants and bring them to book,” he said.
Farmers Abu Sama and Sadhan Kumar Pramanik filed a complaint at Bagha police station.
Bagha police station officer-in-charge (OC) Sazzad Hossain said they have received a complaint over tree feeling. Police visited the area and action will be taken after investigation, he added.