466 
cultural land every year the growers encroach the 
forest land as much as possible and includ them in 
their agricultural land. During the working period 
they usually walk through the forest with their cattle 
and children and exert some indirect pressure on the 
forest vegetation. As a result the whole forest area 
remains under much disturbance by the growers. 
4 GRAZING 
Grazing is another severe problem in the forest area. 
The people living in the forest area maintain herd of 
buffalo, cow, goat and sheep for agricultural purpose. 
The cow and the buffalow are used for ploughing. The 
peasants also get meat, milk wool and manure from 
these animals. Therefore they are the domestic animals 
of many use. As there is no range land in our country, 
these animals graze in the forest and there is no way 
to stop it. During grazing, browsing and trampling 
they eat and destroy the young seedlings and thus 
cause imbalance in the natural ecosystem. Failure of 
plantation and coppice area occured many years in the 
past due to this uncontrolled grazing. Such situation 
arises when large areas adjacent to the villages are 
taken up for plantation in the same year. The villa 
gers suffers badly from the want of grazing land and 
make non-cooperation in raising new plantation. Some 
times they damage it by cutting and pulling the seed 
lings and make the plantation a failure. Finally the 
villagers use it as a grazing field. 
5 FIRE HAZARD 
Every year the ground fire over run the whole forest 
during the summer. It has been mentioned that the sal 
forest is a deciduous forest and the dry leaves accu 
mulate on the forest floor during the month of Febru 
ary and March and make a thick carpet of leaves under 
the trees. This time the grasses also dry up. It has 
been found that the fire is mostly intentionally 
started in the forest by the owner of the agricul 
tural land or by their shepherds with a view to burn 
the leaves and grasses. The ashes thus produce is 
washed down by subsequent rain to the baidland and 
increases the fertility. Some times the fire also 
start from the burning end of cigarettes thrown by 
the workers. 
The top soil on the forest floor losses all humess 
and the existing regeneration die back. Sal seeds 
which fall during the month of May germinate profusely 
on the bare ground and die back Sal seedlings give 
rise to vigorous coppice shoots. But the young coppice 
losses the early growth. New and young plantation 
beceunes a failure due to death of seedlings by such 
ground fire. No crown fire have ever been seen in 
this forest area. 
6 LAND FOR PUBLIC INTEREST 
For the sake of public interest some establishments 
have been built up in the forest area. Bangladesh 
Defence Department, Bangladesh Air Force, Bangladesh 
Railway, Machine tools factory, Roads and High Ways 
and Radio Bangladesh have acquired a vast area of 
land. Many market places have also been developed in 
and near the forest area. The forest undoubtedly 
suffers from their indirect long and short term 
pressure continuously. 
7 RECREATIONAL FACILITY IN THE FOREST 
About sixteen thousand acres of forest land has been 
declared as Bhawal National Park to provide recrea 
tional facility to the people of the Dhaka Metropo 
litan city and the people living around area. The main 
centre of the park is situated on the Dhaka - Mymen- 
singh High Way which is about 26 miles away from the 
Dhaka city. The forest was subject to serious biotic 
interference for the last two decades and crop condi 
tion was deteriorated and threatened the very exis 
tence of the forest in the region. There is a steady 
rise in the number of local visitors since the inau 
guration of the Park in 1974. For the present more 
than thirty thousand picnickers enter into the Park 
area by week end during winter. The visit of the 
foreign national are also increasing. This recrea 
tional facility in the forest indirectly assists in 
preserving the flora and fauna and prevents the people 
from doing damage to the forest resources. More over 
the development of tourism will create opportunities 
for employment as guide, assistants and in various 
ancillary services for lot of local people who might 
otherwise engage in illegal shooting, timber cutting, 
cultivation and other desruptive uses of forest eco 
system. 
8 ARTIFICIAL PLANTATION 
Due to political disturbance in the country during 
1969-70 and 1973-74 the forest suffered very badly. 
The uncontrolled felling and encroachment turned the 
major area of the forest clear and the valuable old 
plantation were damaged by miscreants. A B a result 
whole of the Dhaka forest became abnormal and con 
verted to a coppice forest of one to fifteen years 
old. To stop further deterioration of the forest the 
extraction were completly stopped and the encroached 
area were planed to recover by reforestation. Since 
1970 some of the recovered blank areas have been 
planted up with first growing valuable species like 
Minjri (Cassia sia mea), Mahogony (Swietenia macro- 
phylla), Neem (Melia spp.), Gamar (Gmelina arborea), 
Teak (Tectona grandis), Jam (Eugenia jambolana), 
Jarul (Lagerstroemia flosreginas), Koroi (Albizia 
procera), Kadom (Anthocephalus cadamba), Gazari 
(Shorea robusta), Babul (Acacia arabica) etc. Exotic 
trials with Eucalyptus and other species have also 
been given in the area and the result is very good. 
Nearly four thousand acres of land have been reforested 
by now to increase the forest cover. 
9 WILD LIFE 
Once the forest was full of with various wild animals 
and birds. Among these leopard, wild boar, barking 
deer, monkey,, jackle, fox etc. were very common 
animals. Different kind of beautiful birds and birds 
of prey also lived there. Now a days they Eire not seen 
at all in the forest area without some minor species. 
They have been eradicated due to illicit hunting and 
change of environment. As a result the ecosystem of 
the forest has totally been lost which has severe 
impact on natural growth and vigour of the forest. 
10 PHOTOINTERPRETATION RESULT 
The aerial photographs of the study area flown in 
1952, 1975 and 1983 were studied under mirror stereos 
cope. Landsat imagery of different year have also been 
studied. The forest cover, new plantation, villages, 
market places, scattered huts etc. have been identi 
fied. The height classes in some places have been 
improved. Some forest have been converted into scrub 
forest. Settlements and habitation have been increased. 
The area of scrub forest has also been increased. More 
areas have gone under arable land and fruit orchard. 
The forest cover of the above period have been measured 
independently. In 1952 the forest area covered appro 
ximately 230.0 sq km. In 1975» it did not change