TEAM HERALD
PANJIM: Both state and central governments have placed the Western Ghats Ecology Experts Panel report in a wrong way before the people, the chairman of the Committee Madhav Gadgil said today.
Speaking at a People’s Convention to discuss on issues of nature-friendly and people-oriented development of the Western Ghats tract, he alleged that the state and centre had formed the K Kasturirangan Committee to examine the Gadgil report so as to dilute and confuse the issue.
Gadgil argued that the recommendations of his report on the economic developments had to be taken to the grass root levels and placed before bodies like the gram sabhas.
The objective of the convention was to arrive at strategies of informing, engaging and empowering people to make decisions that will marry development to conservation and with a common interest in safeguarding our natural heritage while enhancing the quality of people’s lives.
Also present was Dr V S Vijayan, formerly Chairman, Kerala State Biodiversity Board.
It may be recalled that the Government had taken objections to the Gadgil Committee’s report on the Western Ghats, calling some of the recommendations as extreme.
“If we go on conserving the area as eco-sensitive, then there won’t be much land left for development,” Minister Alina Saldanha had told reportedly told media pointing out to the state’s limited land-mass.
