Tension broke out at Koya Poshamguda village in Dandepalli mandal of Mancheiral district on Friday when a group of aggrieved Adivasi women put up stiff resistance to the attempts by the Forest department personnel to remove their tents/ makeshift shelters terming them as “illegal structures” in the reserve forest area.
A large posse of forest staff, accompanied by police, arrived at the site as part of what they called “anti-encroachment drive” to remove the “illegal structures” from the forest land, sources said.
The aggrieved Adivasis mainly women, inhabiting the makeshift shelters, put up strong resistance to the drive claiming that they were engaged in “podu cultivation” in the lands for many years.
