Ooty: The Tamil Nadu Green Movement (TNGM) has stoutly opposed the proposed Bengaluru- Sathyamangalam railway line under the modified route proposal as it would cut across a hugely sensitive tiger zones.
Claiming that the railway administration has drawn up a proposal to the tune of Rs 280 crore to submit it to the Centre, Mr. S. Jayachandran, joint secretary of the TNGM told DC here that though the proposed Chamrajnagar (Karnataka)-Sathyamangalam railway line project in the forest was abandoned a decade ago due to objections raised by Green organisations, the railways was making another attempt for the project by making some modifications.
“Earlier, the railways drew a proposal to directly link Chamrajnagar with Sathyamangalam. Now, they have modified it a little by including other places like Thalavadi and the borders of Thengumarahada jungles which is a tiger reserve buffer zone of the Mudumalai Tiger Reserve (MTR) to make it a Bengaluru-Sathyamangalam railway line project,” he explained.
The new railway line proposal covering around 210-km traverses through Biligiri Rangasamy Temple Tiger Reserve (BTR) in Karnataka and Sathyamangalam Tiger Reserve (STR) in Erode district, he said. Both BTR and STR and the adjacent MTR boundary are core tiger zones in the inter-state border, he noted.
“While the nation has been paying greater focus now to conserve the tiger and its prime and pristine habitats, and government knows how challenging this is, it is shocking to note that the railways, after a decade is now trying to re-shape the railway line project amidst the STR,” he added.
Stating that the proposed new railway line would be disastrous to ecology and the tiger habitat in the BTR, STR and MTR buffer zones, Mr.Jayachandran said that the TNGM had already filed a petition before the centrally empowered committee constituted by the Supreme Court on this issue, when the Chamrajnagar-Sathyamangalam railway line project had cropped up a decade ago.
“This still holds good since the STR is involved in it. The railways should scrap the present new proposal, as the lives of tigers and the ecology of tiger reserves are more important than a railway line amidst the jungles,” he passionately pleaded.
