Last week, a six-year-old elephant in the Mudumalai Tiger Reserve in the Nilgiris was found lying weak and exhausted in a private property, possibly due to the lack of green fodder and severe heat in the hills this year. Reminiscent of 2017, when a number of elephants died of thirst and starvation, 2024 too is set to be a challenging year for wildlife and conservation in the Western Ghats.
The hills of South India are expected to be a source of refuge for people trying to escape the heatwaves in the cities. Conservationists and experts working in the ecologically fragile Western Ghats have sounded the alarm over the expected surge in tourists to the mountains this year, stating that the increased pressures of tourism, combined with extreme weather, could have a wide-scale environmental impact on local ecosystems. For instance, storage levels in key drinking water sources in the Nilgiris, such as at Parsons Valley and Marlimund, are at 34% and 21% of their total capacities as of April 6.
