Himachal Pradesh Government has sought denotification of state’s five wildlife sanctuaries including the Naina Devi, Shikari Devi, Govind Sagar, Shili and Darlaghat and reorganisation of the boundaries of 28 others. This is to exclude some of the areas of human inhabitations located within sanctuary areas.

In all, the state has 33 wildlife sanctuaries and two national parks viz Great Himalayan National Park and Pin Valley National Park, the habitat of some rare and endangered species.

State’s forest minister J P Naddaon Wednesday informed the state Assembly that the Government had taken into account the problems being faced by people living within sanctuary areas and recommended exclusion of these areas. The final decision, however, will be taken by the Centre.

The issue was raised in the House by Prem Singh (Cong) and B K Chauhan (BJP). It also drew support from former Congress minister Kaul Singh Thakur, Kuldeep Pathania (Cong) and Sudhir Sharma (BJP).

As per the proposal, nearly 69 sq kms of area will be excluded. In the reorganisation process some areas outside the sanctuaries will also be included in the sanctuary areas for better management of wildlife, Nadda said. He maintained that a committee of wildlife experts has visited the sanctuary areas and consulted local representatives before making recommendations to the Centre. It may be recalled that the BJP Government, in 1990, had denotified a portion of the Darlaghat wildlife sanctuary to enable setting-up of a cement plant by Ambuja Cement and later another wildlife sanctuary was denotified for Kol Dam hydel project.