There are 2,000 voters who are directly affected by wild animals in Wards 1 and 7 of Babai Rural Municipality in Dang and 1 of Dangisharan Rural Municipality.
What you should know
Last Saturday, hundreds of locals gathered in Jaljala, Babai Rural Municipality-7. They were not gathered for a party program, nor were they gathered for any meeting or ceremony. Rather, they gathered to reach an agreement on what questions they would collectively ask the candidates who would come to seek votes in the upcoming elections. At this gathering, they also discussed why they would vote for parties that had not listened to them for years and only made promises but did not return after the elections. After the discussion, they came to the conclusion that they would not vote in this election.
There are 2,000 voters in Wards 1 and 7 of Babai Rural Municipality and 1 of Dangisharan Rural Municipality who are directly affected by wild animals. Most of them were voters who gathered there. In the last two fiscal years alone, 457 households have been damaged by wild animals and crops. According to the victim's claim, the loss has been about Rs. 4.5 million. The citizens of this place have become victims as wild animals eat everything from their crops to cattle tied in the shed. After repeated demands were not heard from anywhere, they even threatened to boycott the Falgun 21 elections.
Local Chandra Bahadur Rangumagar said that if the issue of settlement relocation is not resolved, all the villagers will not vote. Chinta Bahadur Budha of Babai Rural Municipality-7 also said the same thing as Chandra. He said, ‘We are suffering from the promise of roads and electricity. That is why we have decided not to vote.’
Four bulls belonging to Thakur Prasad Wali of Jaljala, Babai Rural Municipality-7 were eaten by a tiger in the space of two months. Thakur is now worried about how to survive after not getting a tractor to plow the fields and the tiger ate the bull. He asked, ‘What to eat, what to do?’ How to survive?’
The plight of Dil Bahadur Pariyar of Malaikhola, Babai-7 is no different from Thakur’s. Because last November, a tiger ate two cows and two pigs tied to his pen.
Like Dil Bahadur and Thakur, the citizens of this place are worried about how to live in their place. After the establishment of Banke National Park in 2065 BS, some areas of the former Panchkule and Purandhara VDCs of Dang were declared as buffer zones.
With the declaration of the park, the number of wild animals started increasing. In search of food, wild animals started eating various crops planted by the citizens of the 343 square kilometer buffer zone. Now the citizens of this place are saying that the state has given more priority to wild animals and neglected them.
Residents of the buffer zone of Banke National Park, including those living in areas such as Jaljala, Malaikhola, Majhagaun, Gauje, Asare, Lamitara, and Furkeshalli of Dangisharan Rural Municipality-1, Babai Rural Municipality-1 of Dang district, which is located in the buffer zone of Banke National Park, have said that they will not vote for any candidate in the upcoming election of members of the House of Representatives to be held on Falgun 21, saying that they have not played a role in making them safe from wild animals.
