Ecotourism development and Security Restructuring Based on ‘Hot Spot Analysis’ and ‘Geographical Profiling’ of Seditious Activities in Jungle Mahals of West Bengal

Abstract

Ajodhya Hill in Purulia district of West Bengal is a treasure house of natural beauties, but hilly terrain and thick forest cover have made many parts of this region inaccessible by road and perpetual agricultural drought over decades had weakened the economy of the area. Taking advantage of this physical and economic handicap, an organized group of social and political activists called Left-Wing Extremists (LWE), perpetrating violence and keeping the people of this region under threat. Non-cooperation of local population being the prime obstacle, government security forces with all its intelligence network and muscle power had not been utterly succeed to stop these activities. This UGC (University Grant Commission - Govt. of India) sponsored ‘Minor Research Project’ plans for economic and social stabilization of this region through the promotion of alternate economic practices for underprivileged forest dwellers and involving them in anti-terrorism operations. Taking into account the severity of physical environment and minimum skill level of tribal people, implementation of ‘Ecotourism’ in these forest villages seems to be the best income-generating activity and ecologically permissible too. Due to essentially spatially distributed nature of tourism and terrorism related data and need of various types of spatial and statistical analysis GIS has proven to be a successful means in this study and based on spatial, non-spatial and attribute data overlay (‘Weighted Sum Overlay Analysis’- ARC-GIS 9.2), ecotourism potential zones were identified. The inputs in the form of arc-coverages were assigned relative weightages according to their influence/importance in ecotourism development. Cadastral level action plan maps have been prepared for ecotourism infrastructure development and sustainable land use practices. Spatial database created on last ten years extremist movements and terrorist attacks to identify the spatial pattern, association and causes of vulnerability of the hot spots. Lastly spatial decisions have been made for allocation and relocation of police out posts, military camps and local participatory groups for fast information transfer and rapid action against any kind of social disorder.