Talk:Garo Hills
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Page scope
Garo Hills is a Growing Area in the Shillong Plateau growing region. It treats cannabis in the Garo Hills of Meghalaya: the plots destroyed in South West Garo Hills since 2018, and what colonial sources say about the hills. The districts as administrative units belong at their own pages. Places more local than the range, such as Kuligoan, would be appellations.
Data verification
Check the main page for the sources behind each statement. Discuss the area's extent, its sites, and the accessions and news items that belong to it here.
Discussion
Why the area is on the map
- Kuligoan, Mahendraganj police station, South West Garo Hills. October 2018: 14 patches found, three destroyed, about 400 plants (The Sentinel, 28 October 2018, from a Border Security Force release). December 2018: 2,500 to 2,600 plants in 32 patches destroyed, 40 to 45 patches left (NE Now and The Sentinel, 14 December 2018).
- Bhoiragopi, Zikzak police station, South West Garo Hills. 31 December 2020: more than half an acre burnt by the Border Security Force and the Zikzak police (The Shillong Times, 31 December 2020, and three other outlets).
- The press releases say the crop was grown for smuggling. The landowners named in the reports are not named in the article.
How the border is drawn
- The border is a proxy: the Garo Hills range as its five present districts, West, East, North, South and South West Garo Hills, from their OpenStreetMap administrative relations (2027476, 2027474, 9522478, 2027475, 9522314). The outline measures about 8,150 km², the figure in the infobox.
- Both sites lie in South West Garo Hills; Kuligoan is about 5 km from the Bangladesh border. No report since 2000 was found for the other four districts; they are in the border as parts of the range.
Growing status
The status is Active: cannabis was destroyed in 2018 and 2020. No source read says that growing in the Garo Hills has ended.
Where the sources disagree
- Kuligoan's district. NE Now (14 December 2018) places Kuligoan in "South Garo Hills district", but names the additional magistrate of South West Garo Hills and the deputy commissioner at Ampati, which is the South West Garo Hills headquarters. The Sentinel (28 October 2018) says South West Garo Hills, and Mahendraganj lies there. The article follows South West Garo Hills.
- "Tura". The Sentinel and another outlet headed their reports of the Bhoiragopi operation "in Tura". Tura is in West Garo Hills; the reports' own text places the operation under the Zikzak police station, South West Garo Hills.
- Use in 1879. W. W. Hunter's statistical account (1879, p. 150) says the Garos did not use ganja or other drugs. The Assam circular of 1882 still named the Garo Hills among the hills from which untaxed ganja and bhang came. The article gives both.
Sources not used
- An Assam Tribune report, "Illegal hemp crops destroyed in Garo Hills" (32 patches and 2,800 plants near Kuligaon, Kalaichapara police station), cannot be dated: the page header says 15 September 2010 and the dateline "Dec 13", and its figures match the December 2018 reports.
- Not read: A. Playfair, The Garos (1909), and B. C. Allen, Assam District Gazetteers, vol. X (1906).
- Five peer-reviewed ethnobotanical papers on Khasi, Pnar and Garo plant use were searched: none lists cannabis.