Karnataka: Kappatagudda row rocks House

Bengaluru: Raising the issue of the controversial dropping of a conservation reserve tag for the Kappatagudda hills of Gadag district in the Legislative Assembly on Thursday, the Bharatiya Janata Party accused the government of  deliberately maneouvering to help the Baldota group of companies do gold mining  in the region.

Opposition leader, Jagadish Shettar, who was speaking during the motion to thanks to the Governor's address,  charged that although the locals were keen on preserving the area, often spoken of as the Himalayas of South India, the government had disregarded their views and withdrawn its notification to declare the hills a sanctuary.

Although, Revenue Minister Kagodu Thimmappa tried to defend the government, saying  wildlife areas could be denotified if the officials had not taken the views of people living in the area into account, Mr Shettar produced proceedings of the state Wildlife Board, which showed they had been consulted in the matter.

“Even the local MLAs of Gadag district from around Kapathagudda have said that the people are in favour of saving the forests. Only four or five people arrived at the public hearing and began to object without facts or figures. It was this government which issued the notification and then withdrew it,” he deplored.

When Mr  Thimmappa continued to justify the move, Speaker K B Koliwad said  the denotification may have been carried out in accordance with the law but the intention behind it was questionable.

 Mr Shettar intervened to allege that the Baldota group , which had obtained a gold mining license in the region, had a vested interest in seeing the notification giving a conservation reserve tag to it revoked.

He recalled that during the public hearing, a senior official of the group, H Y Desai, had said  conservation could be carried out elsewhere but mining could only be done in a few places. Responding, Mr Thimmappa  said  the government would consider Mr Shettar’s views.