‘Pong eco-sensitive zone won’t affect residents’

Nurpur, January 5

Environmentalist Milkhi Ram Sharma, who has been engaged in a legal battle in the HP High Court against illegal cultivation of crops in the Pong wetland area since 2015, has claimed that the proposed eco-sensitive zone in the 1-km area from the boundary of the wildlife sanctuary will not affect residents of 51 gram panchayats in Kangra district.

Sharma, while addressing mediapersons at Jawali in the district, alleged that some politicians were misleading the people of the Dehra, Jawali, Fatehpur and Nurpur Assembly constituencies, causing fear of displacement among them after the decision on the zone was implemented.

Dispelling the fear of displacement, Sharma said only the rich, who intended to set up commercial operations like mining facilities, hotels, resorts, sawmills and brick-kilns, would be affected by the eco-sensitive zone.

He said the Pong wetland sanctuary was one of the 662 wildlife sanctuaries where such zones were being defined, adding that the people living on the banks of the Pong wetland were not to be afraid of any displacement after the creation of an eco-sensitive zone. “Houses can be built and agriculture can be carried out in the eco-sensitive zone, there is only the formality of taking permission,” he said.