‘Do Not Disturb Wildlife’ is the message this 23-year-old brings from Ramanathapuram in Coimbatore from where he began his one-man cycle expedition on July 5.
Kalai Selvan’s effort is to cover the major towns on the lap of the Western Ghats as well as Western coast spread across Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Karnataka, Goa, and Maharashtra in 90 days.
His message is focussed on conservation of the Western Ghats in particular. “Destruction of the Western Ghats would mean death for the entire Indian sub continent,” he says.
Depending on the terrain, Kalai Selvan covers 120 km to 150 km every day on his black bicycle. The first part of the expedition will conclude at Lonawala in Maharashtra by the second week of August after covering a few towns such as Coonoor and Udhagamandalam in Tamil Nadu, Kalpetta in Kerala, Madikkeri and Mangalore in Karnataka, and Goa.
During his return trip, he will visit the places on the Western coast such as Mangalore, Kozhikode, and Cochin in Kerala, he said.
He was inspired by the advice of one of his teacher to embark on the lonely expedition, he says.
“During the expedition, I met many environmentalists including K. Jayachandran of the Tamil Nadu Green Movement at Udhagamandalam and interacted with members of the ACCORD, an NGO, working among the tribal people in Gudalur. I also visited many schools,” he said. He will leave Wayanad on Saturday after visiting schools and environmentalists in the district.
