Animal rights activist and BJP leader Maneka Gandhi has written to Kerala chief minister Pinarayi Vijayan following the state government's decision to allow people to enter forests and kill wild boars.

The Kerala forest department has come out with the Agricultural Revival and Human-Wildlife Conflict Mitigation Mission, which will be inaugurated by Vijayan at Kozhikode on Sunday. The programme is aimed at eradicating wild boars encroaching on human habitation.

According to a senior forest department official, MGNREGA workers, farmers, rubber tappers, forest conservation committees and youth clubs will work along with the local bodies to capture wild boars. "The chief wildlife warden will take a call on killing the captured animals. Efforts are on to identify those panchayats with severe wild boar issues," the official told this newspaper.

Maneka said it was not a scientific plan to address the issue. She alleged that 90 per cent of the farmers who were complaining about wild boars had encroached on forest land. "In Kerala, wild boar meat is being sold at ₹500 per kg. There is another serious dimension to this issue. The farmers have spotted the potential of reaping rich dividends from timber. These wild boars pose a threat to their attempts to steal timber,” Maneka told The Telegraph.