Studies on Land Use and Land Cover Patterns in Southern Dandakaryanaya with Special Reference to Forest Fragmentation in and around Bailadila Region

Diploma Thesis , 2016 , 31 Pages , Grade: 79%

Earth Science / Geography - General, Basics

In the ancient Hindu literatures Ramayana, Mahabharata and several Puranas two spiritually significant forests were mentioned namely Naimisharanya in the northern India and Dandakaranya in the south central India.
The word Dandakaranya is formed by joining the two separate words Dandaka and Aranya according to a rule of Sanskrit grammar. Aranya means a forest and Dandaka means punishment and Dandakaranya means Forest of Punishment.

It was described in Hindu mythology that Dandakaranya region was extended from Vindhya hill range, Narmada river and Mahanadi river in the north to Godavari river (in some mythology Krishna river) in the south, from Mahendragiri mountains of Eastern Ghat hills in the east to Wardha river in the west. Near about the beginning of Treta yuga Dandaka was a country ruled by a king named Danda who was the youngest son of the legendary king Ikshvaku, son of Manu Vaivasvata and founder of the Solar Dynasty of kings. Ikshvaku, finding Danda a great fool and the most useless, banished him to this region because he was highly anxious of his actions. Ikshvaku got a capital city built for him from where Danda ruled. But Danda continued to lead a voluptuous life.

Danda’s kulaguru (royal guru) was Shukracharya who lived in an ashram located in the jungle surrounding Dandaka kingdom. Once, when Shukracharya was away, Danda visited the ashram and molested Shukracharya’s daughter Araja, then left the ashram leaving Araja in trauma. When Shukracharya returned, Araja told the entire incident to him. This made Shukracharya very angry and he cursed Danda: "In 7 days, you and your kingdom, all your people and army, shall die. For a hundred yojanas around your city, all life will be consumed by a rain of dust and death shall rule this sinner’s kingdom." Things happened as per the curse. All life was extinguished. Danda perished. Dandaka kingdom was laid waste; in consequence the kingdom became Dandakaranya - the forest of punishment, a region of dense wild forest through which even sunlight did not pass.

Later, Dandakaranya became part of colonial state of Lanka under the reign of Ravana. Khara, a man-eating rakshasa (demon) and younger brother of Ravana was governor of the Dandakaranya province. Dandakaranya became a stronghold of the Rakshasa (demon) and then Dandakaranya was called the forest of demons. In the epic Ramayana, many of the events described in Aranya Kanda were happed in Dandakaranya.

CHAPTER I An overview on Dandakaranya and objectives of the study

1.1 An overview on Dandakaranya

1.1.1 Dandakaranya : Etymology and mythology

In the ancient Hindu literatures Ramayana, Mahabharata and several Puranas two spiritu- ally significant forests were mentioned namely Naimisharanya in the northern India and Dan- dakaranya in the south central India.

The word Dandakaranya is formed by joining the two separate words Dandaka and Aranya according to a rule of Sanskrit grammar. Aranya means a forest and Dandaka means punishment and Dandakaranya means Forest of Punishment.

It was described in Hindu mythology that Dandakaranya region was extended from Vindhya hill range, Narmada river and Mahanadi river in the north to Godavari river (in some mythology Krishna river) in the south, from Mahendragiri mountains of Eastern Ghat hills in the east to Wardha river in the west.

Near about the beginning of Treta yuga Dandaka was a country ruled by a king named Danda who was the youngest son of the legendary king Ikshvaku, son of Manu Vaivasvata and founder of the Solar Dynasty of kings. Ikshvaku, finding Danda a great fool and the most useless, banished him to this region because he was highly anxious of his actions. Ikshvaku got a capital city built for him from where Danda ruled. But Danda continued to lead a voluptuous life. Danda’s kulaguru (royal guru) was Shukracharya who lived in an ashram located in the jungle surrounding Dandaka kingdom. Once, when Shukracharya was away, Danda visited the ashram and molested Shukracharya’s daughter Araja, then left the ashram leaving Araja in trauma. When Shukracharya returned, Araja told the entire incident to him. This made Shukracharya very angry and he cursed Danda: “In 7 days, you and your kingdom, all your people and army, shall die. For a hundred yojanas around your city, all life will be consumed by a rain of dust and death shall rule this sinner’s kingdom.” Things happened as per the curse. All life was extinguished. Danda perished. Dandaka kingdom was laid waste; in consequence the kingdom became Dandakaranya - the forest of punishment, a region of dense wild forest through which even sunlight did not pass.

Later, Dandakaranya became part of colonial state of Lanka under the reign of Ravana. Khara, a man-eating rakshasa (demon) and younger brother of Ravana was governor of the Dandakaranya province. Dandakaranya became a stronghold of the Rakshasa (demon) and then Dandakaranya was called the forest of demons.

In the epic Ramayana, many of the events described in Aranya Kanda were happed in Dan- dakaranya.

1.1.2 Dandakaranya : Present extents

In modern India, the Dandakaranya region does not have any political or administrative boundary. But districts of Bastar division (which includes 7 districts namely Bastar, Bijapur, Dan- tewada, Kanker, Kondagaon, Narayanpur and Sukma) of Chattishgarh state; 4 districts (namely Kalahandi, Koraput, Malkangiri and Nabarangpur) of Odisha state; Gadchiroli and Gondia dis- tricts of Maharastra state and Khambam district of Telengana are considered as present extends of Dandakaranya.

1.1.3 Dandakaranya: Gelogy

Geologically the Dandakaranya region is present on the the Bastar craton. This Bastar craton is rectangular in shape, bounded by Godavari graben in its southwest, Eastern Ghat Mobile Belt in the southeast and in the northwest the Sausar Mobile Belt (Satpura Orogeny) and by Ma- hanadi graben in the northeast (Sridhar et al, 2015). The Bastar craton consists of widespread Tonalite - Trondhjemite - Granodiorite (TTG) gneisses, granite gneiss and migmatites namely Amgaon Group, supracrustals of Bengpal Group, Sukma Group, Sakoli fold belt and Bhopal- patanam granulites occur as enclaves within it (Sridhar et al, 2015). The younger supracrustals in the Bastar craton include the Bailadilla Group, Dongargarh Supergroup and the Sonakhan Group. These supracrustals are overlain by platformal sediments of Chhattisgarh, Indravati, Sukma, Abhujmar, Karihar, Kaskal, Ampani and Phakals basins (Sridhar et al., 2015).

1.1.4 Dandakaranya : Minerals and mines

The Dandakaranya region is a rich source of minerals and fossil fuel. High-grade aluminium ore (bauxite), chlorite, coal, corundum, gemstone (acquamarine, alexandrite, beryle, cat’s eye, garnet, moonstone, ruby, sapphire, topaz and tourmaline), granite (coloured decorative stone), graphite, iron ores (Hematite and Titano-Magnetite), limestone and dolomite, manganese, mica, quartz, tin ore (cassiterite) are mined from this region. Some of the largest mining areas of the world such as Bailadila iron ore range and Koraput bauxite ore range are present in this area.

1.1.5 Dandakaranya : Forest and wildlife

Forests of Dandakaranya are of tropical moist deciduous forest (dominants mainly deciduous but sub-dominants and lower story largely evergreen top canopy even and dense but 25 m high) and tropical dry deciduous forest (entirely deciduous or nearly so top canopy uneven rarely over 25 m high) type. Sal (Shorea robusta) is the dominant plant in Dandakaranya in association with Mahua (Madhuca longifolia), Amla (Phyllanthus emblica), Bija (Pterocarpus marsupium), Dhawra (Anogeissus latifolia), Karra (Cleistanthus collinus), Karunj (Pongamia pinnata), Kusum (Schleichera oleosa), Saja (Terminalia tomentosa), Tendu (Diospyros melanoxylon), Bamboo (Den- drocalamus strictus) and Fishtail palm / Sulphi (Caryota urens). Beside there are also rich patches of grasslands present in Dandakaranya. The floristic elements show some affinities with the flora of Assam- Bihar, Eastern Ghats, Western Ghats as well as Central Indian region (Govekar, 2008). In the present extends of Dandakaranya, two National Parks (Indravati National Park and Kanger Valley National Park) and five Wildlife Sanctuaries (Balimela Wildlife Sanctuary, Bar- nawapara Wildlife Sanctuary, Karlapat Wildlife Sanctuary, Pamed Wildlife Sanctuary and Si- tanadi Wildlife Sanctuary) are established where natural and wild fauna and flora are protected by law. Besides, there are thousands of sacred groves where wild flora and fauna are protected traditionally by the aborigines. In 2007, Ministry of Environment, Forests and Climate Change,

Government of India designated hilly forest area of Abujmarh - the unknown hills, spread over about 3,900 square km as a potential sites to be designated as Biosphere Reserve.

Some important wild fauna of Dandakaranya are Royal bengal tiger (Panthera tigris tigris), Indian leopard (Panthera pardus fusca), Indian elephant (Elephas maximus indicus), Black buck (Antilope cervicapra), Wild dog (Cuon alpinus), Sloth bear (Melursus ursinus), Barking deer (Muntiacus muntjak), Sambar (Rusa unicolor) etc.

Some of the fauna are endemic to Dandakaranya i.e. they do not found any other place of the world. For example, a troglobitic (lives entirely in the dark parts of caves) population of Indore- onectes evezardi, Day, 1872 commonly called stone loache, a fish under family Nemacheilidae is found only in Gopansar cave (Kotumsar cave) of Kanger Valley National Park.

1.1.6 Dandakaranya : The tribals

The tribals of Dandakaranya region are unique and have distinctive tribal culture and her- itage. Each tribal group enjoys their own unique traditional living styles. Each tribe has de- veloped its own dialects and differs from each other in their costume, eating habits, traditions and even worships different form of god and goddess. Some important tribal groups of Dan- dakaranya are Abhuj Maria, Bison Horn Maria, Bhatra Bhatra, Bonda, Dhurvaa, Gond, Halbaa, Kondha, Muria, Paraja and Shabar.

1.1.7 Dandakaranya : The DNK project

In spite of spiritual and religious significance, the Dandakaranya region was in ignorance till 1958, when Government of India started The Dandakaranya Project (DNK Project). This DNK Project was started to settle the Bengali Hindu refugee came from Bangladesh (then East Pakistan) after independence and separation (in 1947) of nations. During DNK projects and other projects some development activities such as new railway tracks, highways and power plants were build up in this region.

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Plate 1: Present and mythological extents of Dandakaranya

1.1.8 Dandakaranya : BRGF program

The Dandakaranya region is suffering from the greatest illiteracy and poverty in India. A total of 22 districts of which 15 districts (Bastar, Bijapur, Bilaspur, Dantewada, Dhamtari, Jash- pur, Kabirdham, Kanker, Korba, Koriya, Mahasammund, Narayanpur, Raigarh, Rajnandgaon and Sarguja) from Chattishgarh state, 4 districts (Kalahandi, Koraput, Malkangiri and Nabarangpur) from Odisha, 1 district (Khammam) from Telengana and 2 districts (Gadchiroli and Gondia) from Maharastra which come under present extends of Dandakaranya region are included in Backward Regions Grant Fund (BRGF) program of Government of India.

1.2 Objectives of the study

To know changes of land use land cover pattern in southern Dandakaranya. To know forest fragmentation in and around Bailadila hill iron ore range.

CHAPTER II Land use land cover changes of southern Dandakaranya

2.1 Introduction

Natural Resources Management and Environment Department of Food and Agriculture Or- ganization of the United Nations (2000) defines land cover as the observed (bio)physical cover on the earth’s surface and land use as the arrangements, activities and inputs people undertake in a certain land cover type to produce, change or maintain it. Simply, land cover is the physical material at the surface of the earth and land use is the human modification of natural environ- ment or wilderness into built environment such as fields, pastures and settlements (Samanta and Hazra, 2012). Land use is never static, but it is constantly changing in response to dynamic interaction between drivers and feedback from land-use change to these drivers (Lambin, Geist and Lepers, 2003). Land-use change is a spatial property observed at the scale of a landscape. It is the sum of many small, local-scale changes in land allocation that reinforce or cancel each other (Lambin, Geist and Lepers, 2003).

Concerns about land-use/cover change emerged in the research agenda on global environ- mental change several decades ago with the realization that land surface processes influence climate (Lambin, Geist and Lepers, 2003). Over the last few decades, numerous researchers have improved measurements of land-cover change, the understanding of the causes of land- use change, and predictive models of land-use/cover change (Lambin, Geist and Lepers, 2003). Knowledge of land use and land cover change is important for many perspective planning and natural resource management initiative (Samanta and Hazra, 2012).

In present times, the remote sensing and GIS technologies are widely used to study the characteristics and changes of land use and land cover. Change detection analysis using mul- titemporal satellite data attempts to discriminate areas of land cover change between dates of imaging (Samanta and Hazra, 2012).

Till date, very few remote sensing and GIS based works on land-use/cover as well as other aspects in the Dandakaranya, especially southern Dandakaranya have done.In 1998, a study on forest cover of the area was conducted by a committee constituted by Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change consisting of representative from Forest Survey of India (FSI), Botan- ical Survey of India (BSI), Indian Bureau of Mines (IBM), Geological Survey of India (GSI), National Remote Sensing Agency (NRSA), Indian School of Mines (ISM), Federation of Indian Mining Industries (FIMI) and Steel Authority of India (SAIL) (Central Pollution Control Board, 2007). Reddy et al. (2009) assessed large-scale deforestation of Nawarangpur district, Orissa. Pattanaik et al. (2011) had studied deforestation in Malkangiri district, Odisha. Thakur et al. (2014) characterized the land use, vegetation structure, and diversity in the Barnowpara Sanc- tuary. Kumari (2015) had studied on management of water runoff in in Bailadila Range using geoinformatic techniques. Sudhakar, Pujar and Anupama (2015) studied the palaeovegetation and reconstruction of vegetation types in Jagdalpur forest division using remote sensing and GIS techniques.

In the present study, land use and land cover change of southern Dandakaranya over the span of 25 years (from 1991 to 2016) is documented for the first time.

2.2 Materials and methods

2.2.1 Study area

Present study area is located in the southern part of Dandakaranya region. It is bounded by Indravati river on the north and north - west, Kolab (Sabai) river on the east, Godavari river on the south and south west. It includes 4 districts of the state of Chattishgarh, namely Bastar, Bijapur, Dantewada and Sukma. Total area of the study site is about 22097.55 square km.

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Plate 2: Location of southern Dandakaranya

2.2.2 Methodology for land use land cover change detection

Landsat satellite images of three years - 1991, 2004 and 2016 was collected from USGS Glo- vis. The collected images were subjected to several processing techniques namely layer stack, spectral enhancement and mosaicking. The area of interest (in present case, southern Dan- dakaranya) was digitized from Google Earth. The area of interest (in present case, southern Dandakaranya) was extracted from the processed raster file. The images were subjected to visual interpretation and supervised classification for analysis of land use land cover changes. Land use land cover was classified into 5 class namely dense forest, moderately dense forest, open forest, unused land and agriculture and settlement. For analysing the change rate for land use land cover assessment, following equation proposed by Puyravaud (2003) was used:

Change rate = [{1/(t2-t1)} ln(A2/A1)] Where,

t1 = base year

t2 = current year

A1 = area of a class in base year A2 = area of a class in current year ln = natural logarithm

NDVI images of the study area were generated by following equation: NDVI = (NIR band - Red band) / (NIR band + Red band)

For all geoinformatic and statistical procedures Erdas Imagine 2011, Arc GIS 10.3, QGIS 2.8.8, Microsoft Office Excel 2007 and R 3.1.1 software were used.

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Figure 1: Conceptual frame work of methodology to study land use and land cover changes of southern Dandakaranya

2.3 Results

2.3.1 Land use land cover changes

From the study it was found that dense forest cover was decreased from 5054.521 square km (22.9% of total area) in 1991 to 4744.297 square km (21.5% of total area) in 2004 to 2707.677 square km (12.3% of total area) in 2016, moderately dense forest cover was increased from 5133.42 square km (23.2% of total area) in 1991 to 6473.01 square km (29.3% of total area) in 2004, then decreased to 6350.88 square km (28.7% of total area) in 2016; open forest cover was decreased from 5251.96 square km (23.8% of total area) in 1991 to 4052.237 square km (18.3% of total area) in 2004, then increased to 4559.491 square km (20.6% of total area) in 2016; unused land was decreased from 2547.58 square km (11.50% of total area) in 1991 to 2300.19 square km (10.40% of total area) in 2004, then increased to 3104.99 square km (14.10% of total area) in 2016; agriculture and settlement area was increased from 3806.3 square km (17.20% of total area) in 1991 to 4209.908 square km (19.10% of total area) in 2004, then again increased to 5374.511 square km (24.30% of total area) in 2016.

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• College: Jadavpur University
• Course: Post Graduate Diploma in Remote Sensing and GIS
• Grade: 79%
• Author: Kritish De (Author)
• Publication Year: 2016
• Pages: 31
• Catalog Number: V437233
• ISBN (eBook): 9783668775374
• ISBN (Book): 9783668775381
• Language: English
• Tags: studies, land, cover, patterns, southern, dandakaryanaya, special, reference, forest, fragmentation, bailadila, region