GOALPARA, June 4 - Braving the inclement weather, the members of the Ellora Vigyan Mancha (EVM), Goalpara branch and a section of conscious public and nature lovers gathered at BOC point of Goalpara town, keeping the minimum social distance from each other to symbolically staged a protest recently against the decision of the National Board for Wildlife for allowing coal mining in the Saleki area of the Dehing Patkai Wildlife sanctuary.
While many protestors wearing masks displayed posters and placards and raised slogans against the government�s recommendation to allow coal mining in the Dehing Reserve Forest and urged not to allow coal extraction in the area which falls under the wildlife sanctuary.
According to former principal of Goalpara College, Dr Ratan Bhattacharya, the Dehing Patkai Wildlife Sanctuary is in the districts of Dibrugarh and Tinsukia and the Assam government declared as a sanctuary, the largest rainforest in India in 2004.
He also said that the sanctuary is a biodiversity hotspot which is a home to a variety of flora and fauna of which most of these are critically engendered besides being a designated elephant corridor.
A cross section of protestors while talking to The Assam Tribune alleged that the recent permission given by the NBWL to the CIL to carry out mining activities around 98.59 hectares of land in the Dehing Patkai Wildlife sanctuary will have an adverse impact on the environment.
Meanwhile, the protestors raised the environmental issues relating to the massive blowout at a well of Oil India Limited recently at Baghjan (Tinsukia district) spewing out hydrocarbon, crude oil into the atmosphere thereby polluting the entire area.
