The Belagavi District Police have registered a complaint against unidentified residents of three villages in Gokak taluk of Belagavi district who are said to have assaulted forest and police officials during encroachment clearance in forest land.
As many as 11 forest officials and personnel, including Range Forest Officer Sanjiv Savasuddi and a police constable, were injured when encroachers threw stones at them.
The incident happened on Sunday. The complaint was registered on Monday.
A team of officers had gone to the forest surrounding Midanakatti, Elapatti and Keseppanahatti villages in Gokak.
The officers had clear information that villagers had encroached upon around 350 acres of forest land. The encroachments had been cleared once in the past and forest officials had fenced the area.
On Saturday, officials were tipped off by a credible source that some farmers had cut the fencing wire and threw down the marker stones.
When the forest officials were restoring the marker stones and tying back the broken wires, they got into a fight with some angry villagers. The forest officials have in their complaint said that the encroachers started throwing stones at them. Some of the personnel were also stopped from leaving the area.
