Forest department to start night camping at Okhla sanctuary

Noida: The Gautam Budh Nagar forest department will soon start the night camping facility at the Okhla Bird Sanctuary, the city’s only eco-sensitive zone, to promote ecotourism, officials said

Noida: The Gautam Budh Nagar forest department will soon start the night camping facility at the Okhla Bird Sanctuary, the city’s only eco-sensitive zone, to promote ecotourism, officials said.

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The department said that permission to build six cottages in the sanctuary has already been received from the Union environment ministry and prefabricated structures will be installed near the sanctuary’s gate number two by May this year.

While environmentalists believe that the step may hamper “already disturbed” eco-sensitive zone, officials said that the step is being taken to attract more people towards birding and that the camping will not affect the sanctuary’s ecology.

“Six cottages will be installed within the sanctuary over an area of 1500 square metres. As the structures will be pre-fabricated, there will be no disturbance to the ecology of the sanctuary. We had already received permission from the ministry of environment, forest and climate change regarding the same. Total cost of the project is around ₹60 lakh and we will start it in the next two months,” said Pramod Kumar Srivastava, divisional forest officer (DFO), GB Nagar.

He said that the rules and rates for the night camping, including access to the sanctuary during night time, are yet to be decided.

The officials stated that the department will also build “sunset points” at the sanctuary for which the entry timing for the sanctuary will be extended by an hour.

“The bird sanctuary offers some of the most stunning sunsets and we have decided to promote them. So sunset points will be developed in the sanctuary for which we will extend the closing time from current 5pm to 6pm,” said Srivastava.

Spread over 400 hectares, the Okhla Bird Sanctuary is home to a number of water and terrestrial birds. The sanctuary, however, suffers issues like water pollution due to excessive effluents in Yamuna river, and over the years, sanctuary has seen a drop in number of winter migratory birds. The Asian Waterbird Census 2021 held by Wetlands International South Asia in January counted a total 8,068 birds against 8,776 birds in January last year and 12,212 birds in January 2019.

Experts said that while the idea is good, the sanctuary has already suffered a lot due to the development activities around it.

“There will be an impact on the local ecology at the sanctuary. The night camping will cause light pollution, among others, as you cannot expect the campers to camp in the dark. The sanctuary is a smaller area and over the years it has already been disturbed a lot. So, the step seems a good idea as it may attract youth towards nature, but would have been effective if the area was larger,” said Anand Banerjee, a noted conservationist.

Vikrant Tongad, a city-based environmentalist, also objected to the plan stating that the habitat will be affected. “I have nothing against ecotourism, but at the Okhla Bird Sanctuary there is already less land and a high-tension line passes over it. The habitat will be hampered if even a small part of the sanctuary is concretised. The sanctuary needs both land and wetland management,” said Tongad.