Chandigarh: Center alerts the eco-sensitive Sukhna Wildlife Sanctuary area on the Haryana side
Ultimately, a draft notice designating a zone of up to 2.035 km as an eco-sensitive zone (ESZ) on the Haryana side of the Panchkula district, including the Sukhna Wildlife Sanctuary, has been released by the Union Ministry of Environment, Forests, and Climate Change.
The Haryana government proposed to the ministry in February to designate an ESZ, or an area of 1,000 meters surrounding the sanctuary on the Haryana side.
Range and Limitations
The announcement states that the ESZ generally extends up to 1,000 meters from the sanctuary’s Haryana side border. In the northern restricted forest, it is extended an additional 2 kilometers. The ESZ border runs along the edge of the conserved forest on the eastern side and is mostly 1,000 meters in length. To make it coterminus with the restricted forest border, it is expanded on the southeasterly side. The ESZ covers 24.60 sq km in total.
The notice states that the ESZ is split up into four zones. Zone I will extend to a distance of 100 meters from the sanctuary’s edge, while Zone II will cover the region between 100 and 300 meters from the protected area’s edge. Zone III will include the region that is between 300 and 700 meters from the protected area’s edge.
Zone IV will be the remaining territory between 700 and 1,000 meters from the protected area’s edge.
The projected ESZ would cover 6078.98 acres (2460.07 hectares) in total. The area under the Chandimandir Cantonment (small arms firing range of the military station at Chandimandir), Central Soil & Water Conservation Research Farm, some tubewell chambers, paragliding parks, and area under Sector 1 of the Mansa Devi Complex (MDC) are all included in the proposed ESZ. Additionally, part of the area under the Municipal Corporation of Panchkula and Sector 1 comprise the proposed ESZ.
Ten villages—Prempura, Sokhomajri, Damala, Lohgarh, Manakpur Thakardas, Surajpur, Chandimandir Kotla, Darra Kharauni, Rampur, and Saketri/Mahadevpur—fall within the proposed ESZ. Two of these villages, Saketri and Prempura, are located within 700 meters of the sanctuary’s edge, according to the draft notification.
restricted and prohibited actions
The laws established in the Environment (Protection) Act, 1986, as well as its requirements, will apply to all operations conducted inside the ESZ. Commercial mining, stone quarrying, crushing, setting up new sawmills, establishing industries that pollute the air, water, land, noise, etc., using, producing, or processing any hazardous materials, using firewood for commercial purposes, discharging untreated effluents into natural water bodies or land areas, commercial water resources, such as groundwater harvesting, establishing new major hydroelectric projects, businesses, corporations, and large-scale commercial livestock and poultry farms are among the prohibited activities.
Commercial hotel and resort establishment, construction, the building of electrical and communication towers, tree-cutting, road widening and strengthening, the building of new roads, the installation of high-tension transmission lines, the construction of eco-friendly cottages for the short-term temporary habitation of tourists (tents, wooden houses, etc. for eco-friendly tourism activities, eco-tourism activity, etc.) are all examples of regulated activities.
The Chandigarh Administration is in charge of Sukhna Wildlife Sanctuary administratively, and it borders Punjab and Haryana. The Shivalik foothills, where the sanctuary is situated, are unstable geologically and biologically. The sanctuary has 25.9849 square kilometers in total size. The Chandigarh Administration designated this region as a wildlife sanctuary in 1998 with the goal of conserving, enhancing, and growing the local fauna and its natural environment.
Sukhna Lake was deemed a living thing by the Punjab and Haryana High Court in 2020, and the Environment Ministry was ordered to designate an area as an ESZ in both states that was at least one kilometer from the sanctuary’s border.
