Turn Dehing Patkai into national park: Assam CM Sarbananda Sonowal to forest department

GUWAHATI: Assam CM Sarbananda Sonowal on Monday asked the forest department to take necessary steps for the upgrade of Dehing Patkai Wildlife Sanctuary into a national park.
“The chief minister underlined the state government commitment’s to preserve the national resources and environment of the state and highlighted Dehing Patkai’s role in maintaining forest cover in Assam and directed the forest department to take necessary action for the upgrade of Dehing Patkai into a national park in consultation with the Union environment and forest ministry,” the chief minister’s office said.
The state currently has five national parks — Dibru-Saikhowa, Kaziranga, Manas, Nameri and Orang.
The sanctuary spread over Tinsukia, Dibrugarh and Sivasagar district till Arunachal Pradesh in the east houses the state’s only rainforest, also known as ‘The Amazon of East’. It covers an area of 111.942 sqkm and was declared a sanctuary in 2004. It is a part of the Dehing Patkai Elephant Reserve.
The sanctuary is known for more than 100 varieties of orchid diversity, including some endangered ones, and is home to about 30 species of butterflies and more than 200 species of birds. It is also home to a large number of reptiles, elephants, tigers, leopards, golden cats, hoolock gibbons.
The chief minister’s office added, “In order to expedite the process of upgrading Dehing Patkai into a national park, the CM directed the forest department to prepare a draft notification and hold public hearing to take the views of local dwellers residing around the Dehing Patkai Wildlife Sanctuary.” Sonowal has also instructed to prepare an action plan for preserving the adjoining areas of the sanctuary and take the opinion of the public in the adjoining areas.
The sanctuary was recently in news after the National Board for Wildlife permitted the use of 98.59 hectares of land at Saleki inside the reserve for opencast coal mining by North-Easter Coal Field, a unit of Coal India Limited (CIL), triggering widespread protests. On June 4, the Gauhati High Court issued notices to the Centre, state, CIL and other stakeholders after filing a suo moto case against coal mining inside Dehing Patkai. Two more PILs were filed by advocates and a mountaineer in the high court, which fixed July 20 for next hearing of the case.