Mysuru: The President of Coorg Wildlife Society K.C. Biddappa has also written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Union Minister for Transport Nitin Gadkari, Environment Minister Prakash Javadekar, Cabinet Secretary P.K. Sinha, Principal Secretary, Prime Minister’s Office Nripendra Misra and Karnataka Chief Secretary Vijay Bhaskar requesting them to prevent the proposed widening of the existing two-lane NH-275 into four lanes between Kushalnagar and Sampaje as it would cause irreparable damage to the sensitive ecology. 

Focussing on River Cauvery and the damage it would cause to the river, the lifeline of South Karnataka and Tamil Nadu, Biddappa said that the Highway expansion threatens the very existence of Cauvery, affecting the lives of 1.5 crore people. 

“Unfortunately the officialdom and the political dispensation have turned a blind eye to the destruction of Kodagu’s ecology and environment. It is therefore the bounden duty of all the stakeholders including the Centre and State to ensure there is no further degradation of the fragile ecosystem,” he stated. 

“Your new initiative to conserve precious water on a mission mode is timely and critical to save the country from future catastrophe. Therefore, from this perspective, the decision of National Highways Authority of India to convert the existing two-lane NH-275 from Kushalnagar to Sampaje via Madikeri into a four-lane Highway traversing through the mountainous terrain is an invitation to ecological disaster of monumental scale,” he stated.