MADURAI: The Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court on Wednesday sought a status report from the state government on a PIL filed seeking a direction for the strict implementation of forest fire management guidelines in the southern part of Tamil Nadu.
R Manibharathi, an advocate from Madurai, stated in his petition that the erstwhile Centrally Sponsored Scheme (CSS) named Intensification of Forest and Fire Management Scheme (IFMS) was revised and replaced by the Forest Fire Prevention and Management Scheme to focus solely on the issue of forest fire prevention and management and related activities.
The central government issued operational guidelines in this regard in December 2017, and funds were allocated to the States in a 60:40 ratio, with 60 percent contribution from the Centre and 40 % from the State. Though Rs 216.47 lakh was sanctioned to Tamil Nadu and an initial sum of Rs 74.29 lakh was released to the state as the first installment, the second installment was not released, citing that the state did not submit utilisation certificate and progress report for the previous installment, Manibharathi alleged and sought a direction for effective utilisation of funds by the state.
He also claimed the ‘Fire Control Preparedness Guidelines’ and other measures, such as pre-forest fire alerts, etc., are not being implemented, especially in highly sensitive forest areas like the tiger reserve units.