Centre lifts moratorium on large projects in Ratnagiri and Sindhudurg

MUMBAI: The central government has lifted the moratorium on large-scale projects in Ratnagiri and Sindhudurg districts, with the exception of 25 villages falling in the Sawantwadi-Dodamarg wildlife corridor. The revocation dismayed environmentalists, who said it will result in grave harm to the Western Ghats.
The moratorium was lifted by the union ministry of environment and forests (MoEF) late last month. It was first enacted in August 2010 on the orders of the Bombay high court, which was hearing a PIL on the ecological destruction in the Sawantwadi-Dodamarg corridor.The Centre had lifted the freeze in October 2013, but re-imposed it a month later because a decision had not been taken on the Madhav Gadgil-led Western Ghats Ecology Expert Panel report. Following the re-imposition, the Maharashtra government had opposed the embargo, stating that it should be restricted to the villages demarcated as ecologically sensitive areas (ESA) by the Dr K Kasturirangan-led High Level Working Group.
The MoEF circular, issued last month, states that the ministry examined the state government’s plea and the Bombay high court order that links the issue of ESA to the prevention of ecological degradation in the Sawantwadi-Dodamarg corridor. “Keeping in view the proposed ESA in Western Ghats in Ratnagiri and Sindhudurg have been demarcated at the village level, protected from the identified projects which have maximum interventionist and damaging impacts on the ecosystems…the ministry has decided to lift the moratorium with immediate effect from villages falling in the non-ecologically sensitive areas,” it says.
D Stalin, director of NGO Vanashakti, decried the government move, which he said will cause grave harm to the Western Ghats. “Developers, dumper mafia and miners have managed to get the MoEF to trash the vision of protecting the unique biodiversity of the Ghats. By now, a sustainable development model should have been evolved alongside the demarcation of ESA,” he said.