State declines to accept 2 panel reports, Wants 40 villages dropped from ESAs Physical verification exposes discrepancies in village names
PANAJI
The process initiated by the Government of India in November 2013 for the demarcation of ecologically sensitive areas (ESAs) in the Western Ghats region – the UNESCO identified global biodiversity hotspot – has been a subject of debate, opposition, criticism – in all, a complete mess even a decade after two different committees, worked out extensively to zero upon 59,940 square kilometres ESAs covering six States.
All the States including Goa were up in arms against ESA demarcation, basically because the division of the Western Ghats into different zones was made based on aerial data and remote sensing rather than doing the ground assessment? This led to several errors at the ground level.
Panels identify 99 villages
Prof Madhav Gadgil-led Western Ghat Ecology Expert Panel report and High Level Working Group of Kasturirangan identified a total 99 villages in Sattari (56), Sanguem (38) and Canacona (5) as eco sensitive areas. Of the total 1,749 square kilometres, 1,461 square kilometres has been categorised as ESA in these three talukas.
However, a detailed analysis of these committee reports reveals that there are several such villages whose names are distorted by various spellings and there are some which do not form part of Goa. This was highlighted by renowned environmentalist Rajendra Kerkar. The glaring discrepancies also got exposed when the State Environment department team conducted physical verification on ground, way back in 2015.
With almost all the six State governments declining to accept the report arguing that the ESAs were declared without taking the State and the people into confidence and that the decision will affect several inhabitants living in these areas, the Union Ministry for Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEF&CC) had directed the states, nestled in the ranges of Western Ghats to carry out physical demarcation of eco-sensitive boundaries and submit the report for fresh consideration.
Discrepancies in village names
Accordingly, Goa took up physical demarcation of these identified villages. As per the ground assessment, in Sattari, where 56 villages have been categorised as ESA, the names of four villages have been repeated with different spellings – Karambali Bramha & Karambali Buzruk, Hassorde & Aasorde, Ivre khurd & Ivre Budrunk, Kodal & Kodal.
In Sanguem, too, the scene is similar. The repeated names of villages are – Kamarkhand & Kamarkhand, Colem & Kolem, Dongurli & Dongur. The State’s biggest taluka has 38 villages identified as ESA.
Some village names non-existent
Further, the government assessment also revealed that 14 out of 99 villages identified as the ESA do not exist in Goa. It further ascertained that approximately 45-50, identified villages are located within or surrounding wildlife sanctuaries and can be included as ESAs. While there are another 40 villages that are partially located along the boundaries of protected areas and do not fit into the ESA criteria and hence should not be part of the protected zone.
“However, despite bringing these glaring mistakes in the report, the Centre still went ahead and issued three more draft notifications declaring 99 villages as ESAs in Goa. The physical demarcation report, which was submitted in June 2015, was never taken into consideration,” a senior official at the Environment Department explained.
The first draft notification based on the Kasturirangan panel’s recommendation proposing to declare 56,825 square kilometres of the ghats as eco-sensitive area was issued in 2014 while the second draft came in force in 2015.
A third draft was issued in 2018 and in June 2022, the fourth draft was notified.
Goa wants only 59 villages included
Taking the physical demarcation into consideration and small size of the State, the State had in October 2022, wrote to the Union Ministry that there are only 59 villages which strictly pass the conditions, while there are 10 villages which do not fulfil the criteria but for sake of contiguity with the ecologically sensitive areas (ESA) of the neighbouring State of Maharashtra and Karnataka with Goa, may also be considered.
The State pointed out that the natural boundaries such as rivers, streams, nullahs, and roads have been taken into consideration while notifying the wildlife sanctuaries as well as ecologically sensitive areas in Goa.
State recommended that only the parts of those villages which do not entirely fall under ESA for Western Ghats, be notified, instead of the whole village.
What is prohibited?
