Gadchiroli Mining Project and the Tadoba-Indravati Tiger Corridor
Why in the News?
The Nagpur Bench of the Bombay High Court has directed a petitioner challenging an iron-ore mining project in Maharashtra’s Gadchiroli district to first approach the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA).
The petition challenged the environmental clearance, Stage-II forest clearance and exemption from wildlife clearance granted for the diversion of 937.077 hectares of forest land to Lloyds Metals and Energy Ltd. The petitioner argued that the project falls within the Tadoba-Indravati tiger corridor.
The Court observed that the NTCA was the specialised statutory body best placed to determine the corridor’s status.
| UPSC Relevance: GS-3 Environment: Protected Areas, Statutory bodies Prelims: National Tiger Conservation Authority, Tadoba-Andhari Tiger Reserve, Indravati Tiger Reserve |
Why are Tiger Corridors Important?
The Tadoba-Indravati corridor connects the Tadoba-Andhari Tiger Reserve in Maharashtra with the Indravati Tiger Reserve in Chhattisgarh through the forested Gadchiroli landscape.
Such corridors:
- Facilitate tiger dispersal between protected areas;
- Maintain genetic diversity and prevent isolated populations;
- Provide access to prey and breeding territories; and
- Reduce human-wildlife conflict by preserving natural movement routes.
Mining may fragment forests through excavation, roads, blasting, transport and increased human activity. Its impact, therefore, extends beyond the mining lease itself.
What is the NTCA?
The National Tiger Conservation Authority is a statutory body under the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change. The wildlife conservation agency was formed to protect the endangered Bengal tiger in India.
- It was constituted in 2006 under the Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972.
- Chairperson: The Union Environment Minister
- It provides statutory oversight to Project Tiger, launched in 1973.
- NTCA approves Tiger Conservation Plans, sets conservation standards, monitors tiger reserves and evaluates ecologically unsustainable activities such as mining.
- It must protect tiger reserves and areas connecting one protected area with another from unsustainable diversion, except in the public interest and with the approval of the National Board for Wildlife on NTCA’s advice.
About the Tiger Reserves:
1. Tadoba-Andhari Tiger Reserve:
- Location: Chandrapur district in the Vidarbha region of Maharashtra.
- Formation: Comprises Tadoba National Park, established in 1955, and Andhari Wildlife Sanctuary, notified in 1986. It was brought under Project Tiger.
- Area: 1,727.59 sq. km, with a core area of 625.82 sq. km
- Physical features: Named after Tadoba Lake and the Andhari River, which flows through the reserve.
- Vegetation: Southern tropical dry-deciduous forests, dominated by teak and bamboo.
- Fauna: Bengal tiger, leopard, dhole, sloth bear, gaur, sambar and mugger crocodile.
- Importance: It constitutes one of Central India’s major tiger-source populations, from which tigers disperse into the surrounding Chandrapur and Gadchiroli forests.
- Concerns: Mining, linear infrastructure, forest fires and increasing human-tiger conflict in the buffer landscape.
2. Indravati Tiger Reserve:
- Location: Bijapur district in the Bastar region of Chhattisgarh.
- Formation: Indravati became a national park in 1981 and was included under Project Tiger in 1982-83.
- Area: 2,799.07 sq. km with a core area of 1,258.37 sq. km.
- Physical features: Named after the Indravati River, a tributary of the Godavari, which forms its northern boundary.
- Vegetation: Tropical moist and dry deciduous forests, with teak, bamboo, sarai and extensive grasslands.
- Fauna: Tiger, leopard, dhole, sloth bear, gaur and the endangered wild water buffalo.
- Importance: It forms part of a larger inter-State forest landscape connecting Maharashtra, Chhattisgarh, Telangana and Odisha.
- Concerns: Left-Wing Extremism has historically constrained patrolling, wildlife estimation and habitat management; other threats include poaching and infrastructure-driven fragmentation.
The continuity of the Tadoba-Andhari and Indravati Tiger reserves runs largely through the forests of Gadchiroli.
The case demonstrates that tiger conservation cannot remain confined to notified reserve boundaries. Development decisions must adopt a landscape-level and cumulative-impact approach, supported by scientific corridor mapping and transparent scrutiny.