World heritage tag for Western Ghat divide states

The world heritage status to the 39 serial sites in the ecologically sensitive Western Ghats has divided state governments with Karnataka and Kerala opposing the tag and activists angry over exclusion of Goa from the nomination.

Updated on: Jul 5, 2012, 21:26:12 IST

Hindustan Times | By Chetan Chauhan, New Delhi

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The world heritage status to the 39 serial sites in the ecologically sensitive Western Ghats has divided state governments with Karnataka and Kerala opposing the tag and activists angry over exclusion of Goa from the nomination.

The United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) on Monday granted world heritage status to 39 serial natural sites in Western Ghats, asking India to take into account the recommendations of Western Ghats Ecology Expert Panel to further enhance the protection measures.

Madhav Gadgil, who headed the panel, told HT that the government should broaden its approach to protect unique biodiversity of the Western Ghats outside the protected areas. The 39 sites are declared protected areas under different regulations.

"Three-fourth of Lion tailed macaque (whose habitat is also among the 39 sites) are outside the protected area. Unless, the government makes effort to protect them outside protected areas the world heritage tag will not make much difference," Gadgil said.

Karnataka is, however, livid over the status and would be writing to the Central government opposing world heritage status to Western Ghats. What has irked the state government is the possibility of the Centre enforcing additional regulations in wake of UNESCO decision which seeks strengthening buffer zones around the 39 serial sites.

State forest minister CP Yogeshwar said whenever a new law is implemented, it should be ensured that the people in the concerned habitat are not displaced. "Already, there are effective laws to protect the Western Ghats. The Centre should come forward to discuss these issues with the state," he said.

The forest minister said the state government had banned mining in the Western Ghats. It has also imposed a ban on mini-hydel projects in the Ghats, Yogeshwar said. The Congress ruled Kerala had also expressed reservation over the status fearing that it will impact development projects around the sites. Among the 39 sites selected, 20 are in Kerala.

On the other hand, environmental activists of Goa have expressed their unhappiness at not even a single site from Goa finding place in the UNESCO decision. The Goa government had not responded to the invitation by former environment minister Jairam Ramesh in June 2011 to submit a proposal to include Mhadei Wildlife Sanctuary to be declared as a tiger reserve so that it can be nominated for world heritage status. Goa has four wildlife sanctuaries and one national park of Goa, which falls in Western Ghats.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Chetan Chauhan
Chetan Chauhan is the National Affairs Editor looking into all aspects of news and features from across India. A Chevening scholar with over three decades of experience in reporting and news management, Chetan has extensively covered all important aspects of the social sector, political economy, environment and climate change nationally and internationally. He did a journalism course at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford and Digital Media training at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He started as a reporter with The Statesman in 1996 and joined the Hindustan Times in 2000 in the metro bureau covering environment, crime and Delhi politics. He covered hot local news, from the Jessica Lal murder case to the rebellion of Delhi Congress MLAs against then Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit, to the replacement of toxic vehicle fuel with cleaner compressed natural gas (CNG) in the national capital. Some of his stories on air pollution became part of the Supreme Court’s landmark MC Mehta versus Government of India case in the National Capital Region (NCR), forcing the government to take corrective measures. As part of the national political bureau since 2004, he covered important central sectors such as environment, education, social justice, labour, rural development, water resources, renewable energy, agriculture, broadcasting and the Planning Commission for more than a decade producing several exclusive and investigative breaking stories. His specialisation is the environment, having covered at least a dozen United Nations global conferences on climate change, biodiversity and wildlife including climate summits in Paris, Copenhagen and Bali. He also covered India’s two five-year plans ---11th and 12th and reported on drafting and execution of right based laws such as Right to Education, Right to Information and rural job guarantee law, MG-NREGA, now being introduced in new format as VG-RAM-G Act. He has in-depth knowledge of social sector issues. He was one of the first to report on tigers vanishing from Sariska and Panna wildlife reserves in 2004 and 2008, respectively, leading to the setting up of the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) and the introduction of stringent penal provisions for poaching. He has written extensively on the rising human-animal conflict in India and the degradation of India’s biodiversity hotspots because of mining and other activities. Since 2004, Chetan has covered Parliament comprehensively and participated in training on the nuanced coverage of Parliament proceedings. He has travelled extensively across India to cover national and provincial elections since 1998, especially in the Hindi heartland states, considered India’s road to power. He writes a regular column for Hindustan Times, Ecostani, on important national politics, economy, Himalayan ecology and environmental issues. His other responsibilities include providing inputs for edits and edit page articles for the publication, apart from managing news flow from across India.Read More

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