Environment / Assam

GUWAHATI, Dec 11 ? At long last some respite seems to be in hand for the Deepar beel, a wetland of utmost importance for the city and a Ramsar site that has so far been only a victim of the wanton destruction perpetrated by humans on nature. The Assam Science Technology and Environment Council (ASTEC) and the Kamrup district administration have embarked on an ambitious project aimed at injecting a fresh lease of life to the beel, where encroachment and heavy siltation have taken a heavy toll. Once spreading over a sprawling area of 41 sq km, the beel now covers just 4.14 sq km and its depth...

Bokakhat, Dec. 8: Kaziranga National Park will have a great deal more on offer for tourists than just the one-horned rhinoceros from the next season. Bokakhat subdivisional officer D.K. Nath told a group of visiting newsmen that tourists would get a unique flavour of Assam when they visit the national park in the next season.

The official said a new botanical garden, adjacent to the tourist lodges at Kohora, will have a natural waterfall, a variety of trees and flowers having medicinal value, and a children?s park. Work on these has started and is likely to be completely next year. ?The...

MARIANI, Dec 6 ? More than two scores of elephants dwelling at Gibbon Wildlife Sanctuary have been causing a severe menace in the contiguous areas. It is reported that since 1982 the tuskers have killed 45 persons, and inflicted considerable destruction in the region. The sanctuary, which has an area of 19.49 sq km, is primarily a woodland and as such there is a scarcity of grasslands. Moreover it is considered that an elephant requires an area of 10 sq km for its food supply annually. Thus the elephants at the sanctuary has an area of about half square km for themselves. Thus the deficiency...

GUWAHATI, Dec 7 ? The one-man enquiry commission, headed by Sri TL Baruah, IAS (Retd), which probed the cases of allotments in the city?s green belts, has observed that under the prevailing circumstances, it would be futile to keep certain areas reserved as Green Belt Zone. The prevailing situation is such that even the Standing Appeal Committee of the Guwahati Municipal Corporation (GMC) had failed to protect the green belt areas and both the GMC and the Guwahati Metropolitan Development Authority (GMDA) had failed to maintain an effective mechanism for regular physical verification of the...

Kokrajhar, June 4: Suspected National Democratic Front of Boroland (NDFB) militants abducted two forest officials from Kuklung reserve forest under Bijni police station in Bongaigaon district this morning.

Police sources said the two assistant conservators under the West Kokrajhar forest division had gone to Kuklung in two Maruti vans and a truck to check the progress of pillar consolidation.

?Two motorcycle-borne militants kidnapped the officials at gunpoint,? a senior police official said. Other militants who were hiding nearby snatched the car keys. The Kuklung reserve forest is on the...

KOKRAJHAR, June 4 ? Suspected NDFB militants abducted two assistant conservators of forest of western Assam circle area at about 1.30 a m today from Khuk-lung reserve forest. The kidnapped forest officials are Hamidur Hussain and Bodiuz Zaman. According to the sources, the forest officials were abducted while they were inspecting the boundary pillars work at Khuk-lung reserve forest just near the Indo-Bhutan border under Bijni subdivision.

GUWAHATI, June 1 ? Floods caused by the rivers Brahmaputra and Barak and their 52 major tributaries cripple the socio-economic development of Assam and according to a report prepared by the State Water Resources department, floods claim more than 40 lives a year. According to the report, more than 1950 persons lost their lives in floods during the period from 1954 to 2000 and highest number of 221 persons were killed in the year 1988. The total damage to crop and public utilities during the period was estimated to the tune of Rs 4,391.94 crore. During the same period, more than five lakh...

Guwahati, May 29: Assam?s official symbol, the one-horned rhino, has a new price tag: a whopping Rs 15 lakh for each.

The price was stagnant at Rs 6.5 lakh for over a decade till the state government more than doubled the figure with effect from June 1. The notification on the increase in the price was issued recently by the joint secretary of the forest department.

Assam is home to over 80 per cent of the world?s population of the rhinoceros unicornis, whose natural habitats are confined to the Himalayan terrain stretching from central Nepal to parts of the Northeast.

The population of the...

GUWAHATI, May 25 ? The Assam forest department today claimed to have busted a gang of poachers with the arrest of three persons, who had killed two rhinos and decamped with its invaluable horn from Pabitora wildlife sanctuary near here on Friday last. Within 36-hrs of the electrocution of the two rhinos, the gang was nabbed jointly by the forest department authroties and the police, forest minister Pradyut Bordoloi told PTI here.

GUWAHATI, May 24 ? At the tender age of seven years, Purnima Rongpharpi of Tekelangjun in Karbi Anglong has lost all colours of life and is left staring at a bleak future. Affected by deadly fluorosis, Purnima is suffering from acute backpain, chronic dysentry and mattled teeth at such an early stage in her life when she should be playing with toys.

Deadly fluorosis has deprived a large section of population in Karbi Anglong of their child hood and youth. Drinking water in many parts of Karbi Anglong hill district particularly in Tekalangjun, Dengaon, Ransapathar, Lungnit, Kheroni, etc, is...