CHENNAI: The Madras High Court on Friday suggested appropriate action for restricting the movement of vehicles into hills stations to preserve ecological balance which may get affected by unregulated movement of tourists and vehicles in huge numbers.
A special division bench of Justices N Sathish Kumar and D Bharatha Chakravarthy made the suggestion while hearing a batch of petitions on forest-related matters. “You are allowing vehicles without any regulation. It leads to traffic congestion and gathering of huge crowds in hill stations. Local people are not able to go even to hospitals for emergency due to congestion,” the bench said while pointing to swarming of tourists in hill stations like Kodaikanal.
Noting that the Supreme Court has directed restricting vehicle movement into hill stations, the bench directed Additional Advocate General (AAG) J Ravindran, representing the state, to hold a study on the carrying capacity of hill stations like Ooty and Kodaikanal.
Wildlife smuggler
Making a submission on the progress made in the probe into tiger poaching in STR, Special Government Pleader T Seenivasan informed the court that an international wildlife smuggler, Adin Singh alias Kallabawaria, was arrested in Madhya Pradesh. “Investigations have revealed his link with a gang arrested by Tamil Nadu forest department team. A request letter was submitted to the judicial magistrate court in Sathyamangalam to issue a warrant to arrest him and bring him here,” he said.
Singh has currently been taken into custody by the Maharashtra forest department. He also recalled that a notorious Bawaria gang was already arrested by a special team of Forest department in connection with the poaching of tiger.
Liquor bottle buyback
Meanwhile, the state government informed the court that the buyback scheme for empty liquor bottles would be rolled out in Tiruvarur and Nagapattinam from November 15 and in Kanniyakumari, Theni and Dharmapuri from December 15. AAG Ravindran said the scheme has already been implemented in 12 districts and has earned `7.44 crore so far.