Government may seek more time from SC in buffer zone case

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: There is a concern that before the Supreme Court takes up case of buffer zone on January 11th, the government will not be able to complete the proceedings including field investigation. Therefore, the government is planning to seek more time in submitting the documents. In addition, the state government will speed up the process to join the party in the plea submitted by the central government.

Though the SC’s verdict had come on June 3rd concerning 1 km buffer zone from wildlife habitats, the state government had lagged in the proceedings. This has become a setback to the government. The government began planning about field investigation only after Kerala Congress (M) leader, Jose K Mani, submitted a plea on August 19. The decision to appoint an expert committee was taken on August 30. The appointment of the members of the committee including Justice Thottathil Radhakrishnan was done on September 30.

The expert committee was told to submit an interim report within one month and a detailed report within three months. However, not even the interim report is submitted. The first meeting of the committee was convened only on October 30. Field investigation has not been conducted.

On 11th of this month the expert committee convened a meeting and decided to upload the satellite image on the website. After the satellite image was published, around 30,000 petitions have been received.