M F AHMAD
Daltonganj, Dec 2: Twelve timber merchants who have sawmills on railway land for over five or six decades now are deep in crisis following a High Court order directing the railway (here the respondent and east central railway) to get the land vacated and recover all arrears in terms of the licence fee of the sawmills.
Sources said the east central railway has issued a notice to the timber merchants to vacate the land along with the arrears of the licence fee running into Rs 70 lakhs and above which is enough to completely ruin the timber trade in Daltonganj.
A merchant named Indrajeet Singh Dimple said 5000 households are directly or indirectly living on the timber trade.
Another merchant Gyan Chand Pandey said poor women come and take 5 kgs of dry wood for just Rs 5 either to cook food or now to beat winter night. Once this trade is shut, there will be a total collapse of the rural economy as well.
The railways are building pressure for their plots of land to be vacated. It has approached the forest officials to intervene as it issues licences for sawmills besides transit permits for timber intake and outtake to and from the timber marts.
The petitioners (timber merchants) have gone for a two-bench court order from the High Court in the hopes that their over half-a-century-old timber business will be permitted to continue operating normally. They have repeatedly stated and provided written evidence that they are willing to pay the railway’s licence fee for the land on which their timber business has been operating for many years.
As per information, timber merchants face enormous problems as there is no land located or identified for them to take their present timber set up to new locations. Moreover, their new setups will need no objection certificates from various government bodies which is a tedious affair.
The timber merchandise falls under GST rules and any massive dislocation is bound to cause a severe financial crisis to the timber merchants as well as to the government in terms of revenue.
The merchants made it clear that they respect and value the High Court order but the railway has ditched and betrayed them as it can use its land as much as it genuinely requires besides it can have revenue from them in terms of the licence fee by allowing the business.
They said once the land gets vacated, it will be usurped by land mafia and truck operators besides other social crimes may happen as currently due to the timber marts, guards stay there day and night, keeping off the bad elements from the areas.
