SC concerned over attacks on forest guards by poachers

The Supreme Court on Friday asked the central and state governments to protect the forest officials, generally unarmed, who faced brutal assaults by armed poachers.

The top court asked the governments to consider the Assam model and provide their forest guards with arms and bulletproof jackets.

Dealing with a plea by a group of forest officials seeking adequate protection, a bench presided over by Chief Justice S A Bobde said, "A forest ranger is in a situation where he cannot call for help unlike a policeman in a city. No one comes to help him in a forest."

It was really sad and unfortunate that when there is a need, to protect the lives of forest officials, including the forest rangers, they simply had to fight with lathis against the poachers and anti-social elements in the deep forest, the court said.

The bench, also comprising Justices A S Bopanna and V Ramasubramanian, said some states like Assam, Maharashtra have armed forest officials, but there was no information about steps taken by other states.

The court sought joint submission by Solicitor General Tushar Mehta and amicus curiae senior advocate Shyam Divan after four weeks on behalf of the Centre and the states on the issue of securing the life of forest staff.

It also asked the Maharashtra government counsel Rahul Chitnis, Sachin Patil to file a report through Home Secretary regarding attacks on forest guards in the state.

The plea filed in the pending case of T N Godavarman Thirumulpad sought directions and orders from the court to protect the lives of forest officials, rangers and other employees, who, many a time, risked their lives and faced attacks by the poachers and several of them have died while on duty in deep forest areas.