Where the Forests Have No Trees

Of the total 60,000 claims filed under the Forest Rights Act in Assam, nearly 30,000 came from a single district. Little wonder, then, that the administration controls less than a third of Sonitpur’s forests. While no political party minds legalising this mass encroachment in the Bodo heartland, the fate of the wilderness hangs by a 2009 High Court order.