Himachal to redraw boundaries of wildlife protected areas

DHARAMSALA - Himachal Pradesh will redraw the boundaries of its wildlife protected areas to allow development activities, Forest Minister J.P. Nadda told the state assembly here Wednesday.

“Work to rationalise the wildlife protected area in the state would be soon over. As many as 767 villages having a population of 100,564 would be out of the protected area,” he said.

At present, the state has 33 sanctuaries and two national parks. After redrawing the boundaries, the sanctuaries would be reduced to 32 but the number of national parks would be increased to four, Nadda said.

“After the rationalisation, the total protected area (in the state) would increase to 15.44 percent from the existing 12 percent,” he said.

“Two more national parks, Parvati (700 sq. km.) and Hamta (230 sq. km.) in Kullu district would be added. The National Wildlife Board has given green signal to establish these parks,” the minister said during the question hour.

Both the proposed national parks - the Great Himalayan National Park (in Kullu district) and Pin Valley National Park (in Lahaul and Spiti district) have rich wildlife species, he added.