PANAJI: The Supreme Court on Monday issued notices to the Centre and the NGO, Goa Foundation, in a special leave petition filed by the state government challenging the order of the high court of Bombay at Goa in the tiger reserve case.
The Goa government had moved the Supreme Court following the Bombay high court’s order directing it to declare the Mhadei Wildlife Sanctuary and its surrounding areas as a tiger reserve within three months. The order, which was delivered on July 24, gave the state three months to issue the declaration and also directed it to take all steps to prepare a tiger conservation plan within the same time period.
In their judgment, the division bench of Justices Mahesh Sonak and Bharat Deshpande said, “This court cannot blink at the reality that often at the state level, regional, parochial, anthropomorphic, and at times, even narrow political considerations, would prevail over the more significant national interests involved in conserving and protecting the tiger and the tiger habitat.”
The judgment had come days after the Goa government turned down a proposal to declare a tiger reserve.
“While the state’s claim to steer clear of the Orwellian manner of treating some animals more equal than the others is appreciable, this should not be achieved by collectively reducing the level of protection for all wild animals, as the record unfortunately shows,” the high court had observed.
