Bandipur road: Centre suggests alternative routes

The Union Ministry of Road Transport and National Highways on Friday agreed to consider alternative routes to connect between Gundlupet and Sulthan Bathery in Kerala instead of NH-212 which passes through the Bandipur Tiger Reserve.

The ministry has filed an affidavit in the Supreme Court saying that State Highway-90 (Hunsur-Talacauvery) and State Highway-89 (Madikeri-Kutta) in Karnataka and Thalasseri-Bavali (district road) and Katikullam -Tholpatti (district road) in Kerala can be developed as alternatives.

A joint committee of experts comprising officials of Ministry of Environment and Forests and National Tiger Conservation Authority suggested these routes.

Though interior roads in Karnataka ( Hunsuru-Talacauvery and Madikeri-Kutta) have already been developed as state highways with two lanes, Kerala is yet to develop the districts roads Thalasseri-Bavali and Katikullam-Tholpatti as state highways with two lanes, the Centre said.

The Kerala government has to upgrade its two district roads as state highways at its own expenditure including getting necessary clearances from statutory institutions and meeting land acquisition costs.

Once these stretches are developed as state highways by the state government, then entire alternative routes can be declared as National Highways, said the ministry.

On Friday, a bench justices R F Nariman and S Ravindra Bhat gave six weeks’ time to all the parties including Kerala and Karnataka to respond to the proposal by the Centre.

Earlier, while upholding Karnataka’s decision to ban night traffic on the national highway passing through the Bandipur Tiger Reserve, the court had asked the Union government to come out with permanent solution to obviate passing of the highways through protected zones.