KOCHI: Shanthivanam is a retreat, away from the clatter and scorching heat of the city. It isn’t easy to find a serene, natural ecosystem teeming with dragonflies and butterflies amid the chirping of birds. One can spot the wavy trail of snakes among the creepers, shrubs and trees interspersed with three sacred groves and three ponds across the two acres of this manmade forest tucked inside Kottuvally panchayat ward in North Paravur
The serene atmosphere was briefly disturbed by piling work for the construction of a huge transmission tower of KSEB
. Work was temporarily stalled after greens came out in protest.
Shanthivanam was initially a farmland developed into a forest area with trees, sacred groves and ponds. “It is mostly used a study centre by naturalists, botanists and ecologists and is our ancestral property,” said Meena Menon
, who resides in a rustic house in Shanthivanam with her daughter Uttara, a high school student. Due to KSEB’s deep piling work for constructing the huge tower, already one sacred grove has been affected, she said.
“When KSEB had suggested an alternative path for construction of transmission tower, we had accepted it as it would result in less damage to the natural ecosystem. Yet the report cited that we had not accepted the alternative and KSEB had begun piling work to construct the tower based on their initial plan that would cause much damage to plants and sacred groves in the area,” said Menon.
Her father Ravindranath, a naturalist, was keen on maintaining the farmland as a natural, manmade forest which is home to birds, butterflies and snakes. It is a national study centre for ecologists and researchers, said former chairman of Kerala state biodiversity
board V S Vijayan.
KSEB claimed that only 0.62 cents will be used for tower construction, but it has destroyed over 31 cents of forestland in Shanthivanam. KSEB has rendered barren 17 cents of forestland for the work to construct 110kV transmission tower and destroyed another 15 cents by dumping a slurry of cement and gravel which will affect the entire ecosystem, Vijayan said.
KSEB director (distribution and transmission) P Kumaran said the piling work for tower construction was temporarily stopped for two or three days, based on the district collector’s decision to hold a meeting with Shanthivanam’s owner and green activists of the protest committee.
Protest committee member and research student Divya G S said that KSEB’s claim that it has occupied less than one cent is baseless. “It has already begun piling work occupying a large tract of land and dumped the slurry in Shanthivanam. This biodiversity hotspot – which is home to animals, snakes, birds and butterflies – was chosen for installing transmission tower by KSEB without any regard for the natural ecosystem. It is a social cause that requires timely intervention,” she said.