Rath and Patnaik had been visiting villages since the morning, so the mahji came to know of them from other headmen who came calling before the officials arrived. These headmen and other notable people of the neighbouring villages were part of the gram sabha, the local authority with which government departments usually worked. Each gram sabha was responsible for several villages. In total, there were twenty villages around the river for who Devi Hills was sacred.

So by the time Rath, out of breath from walking in the heat, arrived at Deogan, a mostly puzzled but also fearful welcoming committee was waiting for him. The news he brought was grim. The government was going to start mining the area for bauxite. A big factory to process the mineral would also be built there. Roads would be laid (Rath did not mention why roads had not been laid before), even bridges would be built. The face of the entire area would be changed. ‘Improved’ was the word the Collector’s assistant had used.

The Gonds would have to go.

And not just the ones from around Devi Hills. All twenty Gond villages around Devi Hills and across the Tel would have to be moved. It was, after all, going to be a big mine.

After informing the shocked Gonds of this as quickly as he could, Rath had produced the good news, or what he thought would sound like one. The new place, wherever they would be moved, would be full of trees. As many trees as they liked. It would be a better forest than the one around their villages. They would be able to live their lives as they had. And, he had added, they would be given jobs in the bauxite mine and factory. Surely it was reason to celebrate?

At this point, Korok’s narrator said, the headmen interrupted Rath to ask how the state government could take away forest land. This was exactly what Korok would have liked to know. He didn’t understand much about mines and factories, but working at the epho’s house had taught him all he wanted to know about forests. Devi Hills and its surroundings were not a famous wildlife sanctuary or even a humble reserved forest, but they were, officially, a forest area. Of course, the Gonds had been living there before it became an official forest, but they were allowed to, under the law. And the government could not build anything in a protected forest area. That much every Gond, down to the last infant, knew.

At this point Rath had brought out a tiny pair of spectacles, perched it on his nose and read from an official document. According to this, the government had removed Devi Hills from its list of forest areas.