With regular sightings of wild animals on the Tirumala trekking routes and the recent fatal attack on a six-year-old girl by a leopard, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has demanded a judicial probe.
The BJP attributed the foray of animals out of the wild to the presence of red sanders smugglers in Seshachalam forest. “At any given point of time, there are hundreds of smugglers who are out in the forest felling the red sanders”, said the party’s State spokesperson G. Bhanuprakash Reddy.
At a media conference here on Thursday, he accused the State government of deliberately ignoring steps to prevent the recurrence of such incidents. “The State is trying to downplay the red sanders angle in view of the involvement of ruling party leaders in the smuggling,” he said.
The party wondered why the shocking incident had failed to evoke any response from the State government. “The Chief Minister is yet to discuss the issue with State Forest officials. The Minister for Environment and Forest, who incidentally hails from Tirupati, is yet to make a statement to infuse confidence in the devotees,” he charged.
In an bid to undermine the Tirupati Tirumala Devasthanam’s decision to issue sticks to the trekking pilgrims to enable them to shoo away wild animals, Mr. Bhanuprakash Reddy, who formerly served as a TTD trust board member, brought sticks and toy leopards to the media conference. “Beyond the sticks to tackle the wild animals, does the TTD think of anything seriously?” he asked.
He promised Central support for any meaningful proposals geared to finding a permanent solution to the problem.
