“Humans have disproportionately conquered the space on earth. There is very little space for the wildlife to exist,” the Madras High Court observed on Wednesday and upheld the night traffic ban (except for vehicles belonging to the tribals, forest dwellers, local villagers and agriculturalists) imposed on Dhimbam ghat road which was part of a national highway that passes through Sathyamangalam Tiger Reserve and connects Tamil Nadu with Karnataka.
Chief Justice Munishwar Nath Bhandari and Justice D. Bharatha Chakravarthy held that the Collector, heading the District Road Safety Committee, was fully empowered to impose restrictions such as night traffic ban, speed limit, maximum permissible weight and height of commercial vehicles and so on even with respect to national highways and that the role of National Highways Authority of India was limited to collection of toll.
Though 10 animals, including three leopards and three spotted deer, had reportedly died in the stretch in 2021 alone, the judges said, since the Supreme Court had extended the fundamental right to life guaranteed under Article 21 of the Constitution to animals too, the night traffic ban was primarily essential to avoid disturbance to animals, a majority of which were nocturnal, and that road kill was only a secondary reason.
