Centre, state agree to declare 164-km rly stretch as ‘elephant corridor

[Tiger Ramesh]

Why cant they stop train traffic at night like the way they stop traffic on highways thro' National parks?

If a train running at 45 KMPH is okay, then why can't cars, buses and trucks be allowed to operate at 45 KMPH even at nights (may be 30 KMPH).

I have always said that speed is the culprit and shutting down traffic is not the solution. We have to find ways of enforcing speed limits.

We cant have double standards. One for the road and one for the rail.

I dont understand why our NGOs don't go behind Rail traffic thro critical wildlife habitats. May be it is not "lucrative" enough. They seem to pick up soft targets and cut the movement of poor villagers and deprve them of their livelihood.

[Lakshminarayanan Nataraja]

Trains passing through wildlife habitat is big threat. Any rail route proposal passing through sanctuaries should be shelved. Quite fortunately some proposals to lay tracks through forests have been revoked recently. Across India many battles have been faught to keep away tracks from wildlife areas. A few were won. Sathy-Chamrajnagar rail route proposal is one example.

The argument that night traffic should be restored in areas where they have been forbidden for the welfare of wildlife, just because rail traffic is not curtailed is not justifiable. Our people are not considerate enough towards wildlife to respect speed limits no matter whatever speed control measures we try to implement.

Roads in Bandipur or Mudumalai are not just another road. If a vehicle hits a pregnant tigress during night, it will be huge loss.

It is obvious that we need to look at welfare of poor people. Firstly who are affected and to what extent due to night traffic ban is the data which is really required. Based on that data alternative arrangements can definitely be made. Without quantifiable data we cannot know if poor people are really affected due to the ban.

Forest roads in the night should only be used for patrolling and emergency cases can be permitted.