Lonely battle to save last rainforest in N-E
India Times, Copyright © 2000 Times Internet Limited
November 20, 2000
NEW DELHI: It shows up as a mere dot on the atlas, green bodies are unsure of its exact demarcation and both the government and the people are nonchalant about it.
Hidden from the knowledge of most, a lush green patch of nearly 800 sq km rainforest spans the three contiguous reserved forests of Jaipur, upper Dihing and Dirak in Assam's Tinsukia and Dibrugarh districts.
Housing not less than 32 rare, endangered and endemic species, the forests are the last surviving patches of rainforests in this region of the Himalayan foothills. However, deforestation, ignorance and indifference of both the government and the local people are taking a toll on the forests.
"If adequate steps are not taken immediately, the only rainforest of the region will soon vanish," warns Soumyadeep Dutta, director of Nature's Beckon, a little-known environmental activist group waging a lonely battle to save this nature's bounty.
Unbridled industrialisation on the fringes, pressure of a burgeoning population and large-scale clearing of the trees for agriculture and tea plantation pose major threats.
To ensure its conservation, the group has been lobbying hard and sent across a proposal to both the Central and the state governments to club all the three reserve forests into a single administrative unit and turn it into a wildlife sanctuary and name it as Joydihing Wildlife Sanctuary. (UNI)