NEW DELHI, April 24 - Reviewing the situation in the Kaziranga National Park in advance, the Centre on Friday directed the State government to develop a robust system to monitor the movement of heavily loaded vehicles plying through the National Highway through the wildlife sanctuary.
In the backdrop of the perennial floods that hit the Park ever year, Union Minister for Environment and Forest and Information and Broadcasting Prakash Javadekar today held a meeting with State Forest Minister Parimal Suklabaidya and officials of his Ministry and State Forest Department.
After chairing the meeting, the Minister Tweeted: �Chaired a meeting through video conferencing with Assam Forest Minister @ParimalSuklaba1 and his team on issues related to the mitigation of losses of wildlife due to annual floods at Kaziranga and other protected areas of Assam.�
The minister said that he has directed the Assam forest department to make overpass, install speed governors, signages, gates and other cost-effective measures.
�Also directed to make overpasses, install speed governors, signages, gates and other cost effective mitigation measures for prevention of killings of wild animals due to accidental hits by vehicles,� Javadekar tweeted.
�Also asked the State government to develop robust systems to monitor the movement of heavily loaded vehicles plying on roads passing through the KNP in Assam,� he tweeted.
Official sources said that as the annual floods in KNP has become a source of headache for the Centre as well as the State government, therefore this year the Ministry of Environment and Forest has undertaken advance review and passed a series of directions to the Assam government to take a series of measures to mitigate the problem.
Last year the overall flood situation in Kaziranga National Park-cum-Tiger Reserve was one of the worst with 95 per cent of the park being inundated. The 158 forest camps set up by the forest department were also inundated by rising flood waters. While 14 hog deer had been rescued and eight had been hit by vehicles, another four hog deer were under treatment at Borjuri in Kaziranga.
The Kaziranga National Park in Assam is home to the world's largest population of Indian one-horned rhinoceroses and also home to a tiger reserve.
