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using a participatory process to determine the needs of the commu- nity/area, based on the principle that communities should ideally be relocated as a whole, and social ties should not be affected by the process of relocation. This is to ensure that after relocation, their so- cial and cultural identities are safeguarded.
The needs were then prioritised through a participatory process to identify the schemes available to meet specific social and/or eco- nomic needs, the costs and impacts associated with these strategies, and to identify the optimum strategy based on the financial resourc- es available. Based on the above needs, the relocation package was prepared, which in most cases followed a ‘land for land’ strategy. In cases where the land holding was too small, a reasonable minimum extent of land was provided for each family.
A secured landscape for wildlife and people
The families were provided with land for housing in an area not far from the forest with the added benefit of access to facilities like schools, healthcare systems, transport links, and better livelihood op- portunities.
Each family was provided with an equal area of dry land for housing and wet land for agriculture activities that they owned, as well as a house with a toilet, common wells, electricity and solar power fence at the relocation site. Care was taken to ensure that the agricultural land provided to the villagers had good irrigation facilities.
A total of 25.3 acres of land were purchased from 37 families in four corridor villages (Thirulakunnu, Valiya Emmadi, Kottapady and Puli- yankolly) by Wildlife Trust of India (WTI), although they physically oc- cupied over 50 acres of land. In addition to this, partner NGO, Asian Nature Conservation Foundation (ANCF), had purchased 12 acres of land from the Sulthar Vayal village. The villagers were relocated across different time periods- Thirulakunnu was relocated in 2006,
Valiya Emmadi in 2009, Kottapady in 2010 and Puliyankolly in 2011.
Human-wildlife conflict was a major problem when the families lived inside the corridor. Post-relocation, the HEC has reduced greatly with over 90% of the relocated families agreeing that the new location had almost no attacks on the villagers or their property by wildlife, except for stray incidents of depredation by wild boar and elephants.
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