Daijiworld Media Network - Udupi (MS)

Udupi, Nov 11: Kasturirangan Report, which is intended to be implemented by the union government in order to save the Western Ghats, has caused concern to the villagers living in the plateau region of the area.

The union government has made all preparations to implement the report. If the same is brought into action, 48 villages of Dakshina Kannada district will go into the Ecologically Sensitive Area (ESA). In such a scenario, families which are living in this zone have to shift to other places. From the past many years, several protests in this regard have taken place in the district of Dakshina Kannada with regards to this issue. Now the same has started again.

Widespread opposition is expressed in Dakshina Kannada for the implementation of Kasturirangan report which will mark all the villages situated at the plateau region of Western Ghats as ESA and forbidding any kind of development in the area.

The state government had held special gram sabha meetings in all the gram panchayats that fall under the limits mentioned in the report in order to gather the opinion of the villagers. All the 48-gram panchayats had vehemently opposed the project of the union government long ago. However, now again discussions are on to implement the report. Many organizations have taken the lead in protesting against the report implementation. Malnad Janahitha Rakshana Vedike has begun to hold interactive meetings.

Villagers of 48 villages of three taluks of Beltangady, Sullia and Puttur will get affected if the Kasturirangan report is implemented. So preparations are on for a mass-scale protest. In the first phase, protests will be held in the respective taluk offices. It is decided to include all the people representatives of the district, including union minister D V Sadananda Gowda and state BJP president Nalin Kumar Kateel. This information was shared by the convener of Janahitha Rakshana Vedike Kishore Shiradi.

After the first phase of protests, the organizations have decided to hold a series of Satyagrahas in front of the office of assistant commissioner of Puttur. Later, the organizations have formed a plan to block the highway at Gundya, which is the border region of Hassan and Dakshina Kannada.

Malnad Hitha Rakshana Vedike opines that all the people representatives, cutting across party lines, will take part in the protest as the implementation of the report will cause issues for all political parties. Last time around, during the gram panchayat elections also, the issue of Kasturirangan report had created fierce discussions. As the elections are approaching again, this will be a bottleneck for the political parties.