Why over 250 landless beneficiaries of Kerala’s Arippa Bhoosamaram are trapped in bureaucratic deadlock

For more than a decade, over 250 landless families of the Arippa Bhoosamaram in Kerala slept under plastic tarps and wooden sheds, dreaming of the day they could finally call a piece of land their own. Finally that moment arrived in February 2026 with the distribution of official title deeds, but their relief was abruptly cut short when they found themselves trapped in a jurisdictional tug-of-war between the Revenue and Forest Departments. The conflict erupted after the Forest Department issued a stop memo halting the felling of trees on the newly allocated plots, plunging the beneficiaries into complete legal uncertainty over their property rights.