Pressure is mounting on the State government to solve the issue of ban on night traffic on National Highway 766 through the Bandipur Tiger Reserve with a five-member panel appointed by the Supreme Court endorsing the proposal of the Ministry of Road Transport and Highway for constructing elevated sections on the carriageway connecting Kozhikode to Mysuru.
Seeking its intervention, the Nilgiri-Wayanad NH and Railway Action Committee, which is spearheading the campaign to lift the nine-year-old ban, has urged the government to go ahead with the ₹458-crore project to construct elevated sections of 1-km-stretch each on the highway.
The State government should share 50% of the cost as the Centre had agreed to contribute half the cost, T.M. Rasheed, convener, of the Nilgiri-Wayanad NH and Railway Action Committee, said. So far, the government has not reacted positively to the recent developments, he said.
Court action
The committee was one of the petitioners along with others such as the Ooty Hotel Owners’ Association, which had approached the Supreme Court against the ban on vehicles through the park from 9 p.m. to 6 a.m.
At the same time, the Wayanad Prakruthi Samrakshana Samithi, an environmental organisation, has been against lifting the night traffic ban.
It wants the government to protect the environment and wildlife.
Mr. Rasheed said that many vested interests were behind continuing with the night traffic ban and also seeking a complete ban on vehicles on the Kozhikode-Mysuru highway. A lobby in Kerala was working along with the Karnataka government in this regard, he alleged.
The then Deputy Commissioner of Chamarajanagar, Manoj Kumar Meena, had banned the movement of vehicles on NH 766 and NH 67 (Mysuru-Ooty) that pass through Bandipur National Park from 9 p.m. to 6 a.m.
