Good news....Raise a Toast for Christmas

[Roopak Gangadharan]

The Madras High Court has banned all construction activities in the proposed elephant corridors covering all bottlenecks connecting Segur Plateau and Mudumalai Tiger Reserve – part of Nilgiri Biosphere Reserve - in the southern state of Tamil Nadu. Strongly favouring the ‘rights of passage’ of wild elephants, the court also ordered demolition of all illegal commercial ventures within the corridors.

The court last week passed the final ruling in favour of the Tamil Nadu Forest Department in the case against private establishments obstructing movement of wild elephants. The court upheld its interim judgment passed a month ago.

“This is a significant milestone in India’s elephant conservation history. We were always optimistic that the final ruling would be in favour of elephants,” said Dr B Ramakrishnan, Wildlife Trust of India (WTI) field officer, who was among the team of researchers including R Arumugam, consultant, WTI and N Mohanraj, WWF-India assisting the forest department in the case.
http://www.wti.org.in/current-news/0..._nilgiris.html

[Mrudul Godbole]

That is a very positive news for Indian wildlife. I hope in future too, similar actions are taken. Such actions will only help to conserve whatever little wildlife left in the country. Hoping to hear many more such news in the future.

Thanks for updating.

[Sabyasachi Patra]

Thanks Roopak for the news!

Infact, lot of people are not aware that the final verdict has been announced.

It is good that the Madras High Court has banned all construction activities to facilitate an elephant corridors covering all bottlenecks connecting Segur Plateau and Mudumalai, as elephants use this route and ethically they have the first right to the land. It is also good that the court ordered demolition of all illegal commercial ventures within the corridors. Lot of resorts have mushroomed in that area and the destruction caused to the habitat is enormous. In the last two years, I have seen the forests virtually cleaned up due to the anthropogenic pressures. One can also find liquor bottles, plastics etc liberally thrown around. Infact in that area, I had earlier found a polythene bag in the elephant dung laced with blood. The elephant had swallowed the polythene and it had come out with the dung. A smaller herbivore would have died.

This is certainly good news. We have to create such corridors and link up all our wilderness areas again. If you think that our wilderness areas are like jewels, then it will look better if they are in a garland rather than disjointed individual jewels. Lets certainly raise a toast to this positive news and lets work towards this difficult but certainly achievable goal of linking our wilderness areas.

Cheers,
Sabyasachi