The Tamil Nadu government on Friday sanctioned ₹19.5 crore for the establishment of a rescue, treatment and rehabilitation centre (RTRC) for wildlife at Pethikuttai near Sirumugai in Coimbatore district.
Supriya Sahu, Additional Chief Secretary, Environment, Climate Change and Forests, said the state-of-the-art centre would come up on 53 hectares and would be equipped with modern operation theatres and diagnostic tools with trained professionals. “This will be a centre of excellence to work on specialised treatment and care of injured and orphaned animals, including elephant calves, leopards, tigers, birds, ungulates, and reptiles. The centre will extensively work on rewilding animals,” she said.
In September 2021, the government announced in the Assembly that RTRCs would be established for the rescue of injured, orphaned, and ailing wild animals, including those that strayed into habitations. It later accorded administrative sanction for establishing the RTRCs in Coimbatore, Tiruchi, and Tirunelveli districts. It was decided that the project would be implemented in two phases, with the establishment of the centre in Coimbatore first, a Government Order said.
