A pull of monthly compliance returns from the District Forest Officers of the Nilgiris and Erode districts shows that the Tamil Nadu Forest Department issued Section 26 notices under the Indian Forest Act, 1927 against 78 plots totalling 2,118 acres of reserved forest in the Western Ghats. Action — i.e. notification of resumption — has been taken on only 11 plots in the past 36 months.

Six of the encroached plots have, in the meantime, been transferred via Patta correction in revenue records — moving them out of the forest department's legal handle. The DFO returns we pulled (RTI #5102/2026) document this trail.

The monthly returns are not aggregated anywhere publicly. We are working with a forest-rights collective to produce a complete encroachment map across Western Ghats districts.