Hyderabad, March 20: Next time when you visit any wildlife sanctuary, beware not to dump leftover food or food packets around as you may be endangering the wildlife. Many deer, wild boars, blue bulls consume such food or even food packets, which are made of polythene or plastic etc and are prone to diseases.
Awareness drive
In a bid to create awareness among tourists and public about adverse effects of dumping trash, World Wide Fund (WWF) for Nature-India, a charity trust is organising an anti-litter drive at Nagarjunasagar Srisailam Tiger Reserve located in Srisailam on Sunday – the World Forestry Day.
As part of the programme, over 400 students from different schools of Hyderabad and Ranga Reddy districts would distribute free paper or cloth bags to tourists at Mannanur.
Six batches
Segmented into six batches, these students would recollect the bags filled with garbage from tourists at six points on the Mannanur – Domalpenta stretch.
All the collected waste would be handed over to Wildlife Management Division of Achampet Forest Department for recycling or disposing, said WWF-India State Director Farida Tampal at a press conference here on Friday.
Unmindful of the danger posed to animals, tourists dump garbage at will. Forest department authorities collect nearly 30 kilos of garbage every week from the Nagarjunasagar Srisailam Tiger Reserve also known as Sri Rajiv Gandhi Wildlife Sanctuary.
After consuming the trash many animals perish and unfortunately there is no mechanism to control excepting to prevent such incidents, she informed.
The programme is being organised in association with Forest Department, Achampet and Harsha Toyota.
There are plans to sustain the programme through out the year and based on the response, it would be extended to Mothugudem and Papikondalu tourist spots, she added.
WWF- AP Committee member Amala Akkineni and Harsha Toyota Vice-president P. Sivaram Krishna also spoke on the occasion.
Team leaving today
The WWF team would be leaving on Saturday 9 p.m. from their office at NMDC, Mehdipatnam. For further details, contact: 2353-4151
—Agencies