Approval has been received for a proposed manganese mine at Gugaldeh, a tiger corridor between Pench Tiger Reserve and Navegaon Nagzira Tiger Reserve. Expressing the fear that nearly 2 lakh trees in the 100 hectare area will be cut in this project, environmental activists staged a ‘chipko’ protest in the forest of Googledeh on Sunday.
According to the information given by Anasuya Kale Chhabarani, environmental activist and coordinator of Swachh Association, a manganese mine is proposed in 105 hectares area of Gugaldeh near Ramtek. 100 hectares of this area comes under the jurisdiction of the forest department. The approval for the project has also been received from the forest department and the state government stating that the area is not home to tigers and other wildlife. Now only the approval of the Union Ministry of Environment is pending.
Anasuya Kale said, this is the route of tigers traveling between Pench and Nagzira Tiger Reserves in the area. Dense forest is spread over 100 hectares. The proposed mining area, bordering the Pench Tiger Reserve, has physical evidence of habitat for many birds, herbivores and insects, including tigers, leopards and other schedule-1 species. The area falls under the Tiger Corridor of Maharashtra.
The forest is home to many herbs of medicinal and ayurvedic nature and many of its species are threatened with extinction. In spite of this, activists criticized that the approval of the project is unacceptable. It is said by the department that 35 thousand trees will be cut in the project. But she said that the ax will be used on nearly 2 lakh trees in this area of dense forest. They alleged that by destroying the corridors of tigers, human-animal conflict is being encouraged.
In recent times the forest department has hastily allowed wildlife despite the apparent existence of tigers and other animals. A single mine in this area would damage the entire wildlife corridor. The proposed plan is clearly inadequate and wrong. Apart from the mining company, these mines have no socio-economic benefit to anyone, but rather a loss. Kale alleged that there seems to be some political support behind the hasty approval.
Against this background and to protect forests, trees and wildlife, Chipko was devised. Local residents, environmental activists participated in this.