NSCN-IM issues environmental prohibitory guidelines: Use of fire crackers during Diwali banned

The Ministry of Forest & Environment (MFE), GPRN, let out a communiqué on Friday which laid down prohibitory guidelines in order to “adhere to the law of environment”, in view of the exigency connected with the necessity to preserve natural resources in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic crisis.

Appealing the Naga people and the public not to use “fire crackers and other firework as normally seen during the festive season of Diwali,” MFE maintained that with the Covid-19 having penetrated Nagalim in a menacing manner, “fire crackers” would be strictly banned as it mattered the health of the people and the environment. “Logging and random cutting down of trees in the Reserved Forest and community Protected Forest is strictly banned,” the MFE statement added.

Terming fishing and hunting with poisonous chemicals, dynamo and explosives “unethical method”, the statement further said that it was “being viewed very seriously”. The public were rather entreated to use “traditional methods of hunting and fishing” because it “prevents excessive killings and thereby wastage”. MFE further said, “To protect our fauna from avoidable extinction, the sale of wild animals shall stand restricted throughout Nagalim.”

“With the advent of winter season there is tendency to go for reckless burning of forest by individuals and villages,” said the statement.  “This should be rationalized as burning of forest affects our environment directly, which subsequently unbalances our ecological system.”

The statement further noted that Ministry was in cognizant of “random excavation of local sands, boulders and gravels from river beds” which should be stopped forthwith as it was damaging the environment.

The general public was also informed that in the name of taking up development projects, there was random exploitation of rivers, forests and lands in large scale in towns and villages. “This has necessitated proper monitoring by the concerned ministry to see that the concerned agencies undertaking the projects adhere to the law of environment,” the MFE statement added.