Environmentalists concerned over destruction of Galgamuwa forest lands

Belonging to ancient Nakolagane and Thorawamayilawa Viharayas

by Ifham Nizam

Forest lands belonging to two ancient temples in Galgamuwa are being destroyed to make way for large-scale agricultural projects, despite opposition from the Chief Incumbent of temple, environmentalists said.

Chief priest of Nakolagane Rajamaha Vihara, Ven. Rahula Thera, said that of the two thousand acres owned by the temple, one thousand acres have already been encroached.

“Despite repeated complaints, nothing has been done. We have now decided to use 67 acres of neglected paddy fields to grow traditional rice varieties”, he said.

Forest lands coming under the Nakolagane Rajamaha Viharaya and Thorawamayilawa Rajamaha Viharaya are being destroyed using bulldozers, forest officers said.

The forest lands in the catchment of the Palukadawala reservoir belonging to the Nakolagane Rajamaha Viharaya is a key elephant home range in the area and forest lands around the Thorawamayilawa Rajamaha Viharaya act as a corridor for elephants to move from Thabbowa and Galgamuwa to Inginimitiya, elephant expert, Supun Lahiru Prakash said.

He said more than 60 per cent of free range elephants in Northwestern wildlife administrative region live outside the protected areas and they use the forest patches for their survival and moving paths.

Therefore, he believes it is essential to protect such forests to mitigate the human- elephant conflict and for the conservation of elephants in the area.

Thabbowa and Kahalla-Pallekele are the only two protected areas in the region administrated by the Department of Wildlife Conservation. Many attempts were made earlier to drive the elephants into the protected areas. However, the mission has so far not been successful.

The National Human-Elephant Conflict Mitigation Action Plan also emphasizes the importance of protecting the elephant home range outside the protected areas for long-term conservation of the jumbos and mitigation of the human-elephant conflict.

“If necessary steps are not taken to protect the forest areas, where elephants have lived for a long time, they wouldn’t have an alternative other than to invade villages”, he said.

Without solving the problem sustainably, the government plans to drive the elephants to the Wilpattu National Park as discussed at a recent ‘Gama Samaga Pilisandara’ in Karuwalagaswewa. If this happens, it will again lead to an escalation of the problem and also affect conservation efforts, a senior official warned.

All previous attempts to drive elephants living outside the protected areas completely failed. It was repeated in North Western wildlife administrative region as well. There were also many attempts to drive the elephants to Thabbowa and Kahalla-Pallekele sanctuaries and Wilpattu National Park over the past decades, he noted.

However, still the majority of elephants remain outside the protected areas. The Department of Wildlife Conservation had taken a policy decision to discontinue large-scale elephant drives after considering issues raised following the relocation of more than 300 elephants from Walawa left bank area to Lunugamvehera National Park in 2006.

The animals have been chased away for long distances and many elephant calves died on the way due to lack of water and exhaustion. The herds restricted to fenced up protected areas also face difficulties after the drives and starve to death as the result. The elephant population living within the protected areas are also affected as they have to compete with the ‘new comers’ for food. Therefore, it has adversely affected elephant conservation efforts in Sri Lanka, Prakash explained.

Adults males are difficult to drive away as they escape. Later, they return to the same locations and continue to harm lives and damage property. Furthermore, young males in herds who faced repeated drives adopt to human pressures such as fire, loud noises, crackers and even gunshots and become more aggressive towards humans resulting in the conflict escalating, he added.