Kerala - Palakkad   

Research centre for Silent Valley

A success story: Union Minister of State for Forests Jairam Ramesh inaugurating a national seminar on the Silent Valley National Park in Palakkad on Saturday.

PALAKKAD: Union Minister of State for Environment and Forests Jairam Ramesh has said that a biodiversity research centre of international standards will be set up at the Silent Valley National Park. The centre, named after the former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, who helped save the Silent Valley rainforests, will start functioning in 2010, the International Year of Biodiversity.

Mr. Ramesh was speaking after inaugurating a national seminar organised as part of the silver jubilee celebrations of the national park at Mundur, near here, on Saturday. The Minister said Rs.5 crore would be sanctioned to the research centre. On getting the project report from the State government, the Centre would release the money.

He said that in the history of modern environmental movements, two stood out — the Chipko movement, a campaign against tree-felling and construction of the Tehri dam, and the campaign to protect the Silent Valley rainforests.

These two movements made the then Union government, led by Indira Gandhi, enact the Forest Conservation Act, 1980.

The Minister released a stamp on Silent Valley brought out by the Department of Posts. Hilda Abraham, Postmaster-General, Northern Region, Kozhikode, presented the commemorative stamp to the Minister. The Minister honoured the veterans who fought to save the forest. They are Madhav Gadgil, K. Sukumaran, A. Achuthan, Anand Parthsarathy, U.K. Gopalan, Gopalakrishnan Nair (who fought the first case on Silent Valley), M.K. Prasad (then president of the Kerala Shasthra Sahitya Parishad), K. Sreedharan, V.S. Vijayan, Satishchandran Nair, N. Namasivayam and V.M.N. Namboodiripad.

Electricity Minister A.K. Balan announced the dropping of the Pathrakadavu hydel project brought as an alternative to the Silent Valley hydel project by the KSEB as there were apprehensions that it would damage the forests.

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