The State government on Wednesday told the High Court of Karnataka that recommendations made by an expert committee on elephant camps will be implemented in a phased manner with some suggestions like use of gas stove for cooking food for elephants, food diet, etc. having been implemented.
However, the Forest Department has said that it would require three years to shift elephant camps of Rampura, Mathigodu and Belle, situated in the core/critical tiger habitats of Bandipur and Nagarahole tiger reserve as per the recommendation of the committee, which was set up on the direction of the court.
A Division Benchcomprising Chief Justice Abhay Shreeniwas Oka and Justice Hemant Chandagoundar, while hearing a PIL petition, though agreed with the time frame fixed by the government for implementing majority of the recommendations, did not accept the six-months’ time set to procure certain surgical equipment while pointing out that such equipment required to be procured at the earliest.
Stateless stations around main camps for decongesting the main camps would be established within six months, special shelters to house sick elephants would be built in the camps within one year, morphometry (measuring of external shape and dimensions) of every elephant housed in all camps would be taken up every six months, and weighing of every elephant will be done three months by maintaining register for measurements, the government said in its statement.
