Nandankanan Zoological Park in Bhubaneswar. Pictures by Sanjib Mukherjee

Bhubaneswar, Oct. 11: Nandankanan Zoological Park may no more be the perfect stopover for people looking to escape from the city’s concrete jungle.

An affidavit filed by the forest and environment department before the high court last year had said that it had no proposal to declare even an area of one-kilometre around the zoological park as a designated green belt.

Based on the affidavit, the Orissa High Court on September 30, 2011, vacated an interim stay, which was filed on the basis of a PIL in 2002 to impose restrictions on an area of at least one-kilometre around the zoological park.

This has triggered serious concern among green activists. They feel more constructions around the zoological park would ruin the wildlife habitat and affect the drainage system and dynamics of the waterbodies within the park.

According to the Wildlife Conservation Strategy, 2002, lands falling within 10-km of the boundaries of national parks and sanctuaries should be notified as ecologically sensitive areas under provisions of Environment Protection Act, 1986.

Acting on the orders of the Supreme Court, the ministry of environment and forests had written to all states in 2006 to identify such areas. However, in Orissa no initiative was taken and even an official proposal prepared by a former principal chief conservator of forests (PCCF) was never processed for notification.

Wildlife activist Biswajit Mohanty said: “The public interest litigation (PIL) was filed in the high court on May 16, 2002. And the case was vacated just a few days ago. So, there was enough time for the state government to go for the notification during the interim stay period, but unfortunately nowhere in the state the notification on ecologically sensitive areas was carried out. Had the state government been able to notify the guidelines, things would have been different. Perhaps it was done to facilitate mining industry lobbies and now the real estate lobby has taken over. The state administration is partly to be blamed for this mess.”

Saying that the situation will encourage indiscriminate growth of concrete jungles around the zoological park, Mohanty added that the forest and environment department should now gear up its strategies to save the serenity of Nandankanan.

Well-known geologist and retired professor of Utkal University, N.K. Mahalik, said the Kanjia lake inside Nandankanan was part of a major drainage channel from Chandaka forest. The drainage system and the dynamics of the water carrying capacity would change drastically if high-rise structures surround the areas near Nandankanan.

Environmentalist S.N. Patro, founder and working president of Orissa Environment Society, said: “A rise in human habitat would definitely affect the wildlife and natural environment inside Nandankanan. Except biosphere reserves, national parks and sanctuaries are under the administrative control of the state government. So, many decisions are changed as per needs and that gives rise to a number of problems.”

Sources said that while the director of Nandankanan filed an affidavit on November 2, 2010, saying that they did not have any plan to have a green belt around the park, on January 6, this year the state wildlife board decided to ask the housing and urban development department and Bhubaneswar Development Authority (BDA) to restrict construction activity within a one-km radius of the zoo.

J.D. Sharma, PCCF (Wildlife), said: “For the green belt the forest department cannot buy the land as they are under private occupation.”

A senior BDA official said: “As most of the lands are under private possession, the thought of having a green belt seems slightly ambitious. Housing pressure is growing in Bhubaneswar.”