India | Government moves to abolish world’s only PA devoted to freshwater turtle conservation

New Delhi: Freshwater turtles may be small, but they are proving to be a big stumbling block for the government’s plans to dredge the Ganga for a multi-crore inland waterways project that will pass through Varanasi, Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s constituency, and end in Haldia in West Bengal.

The ‘Kachhua’ or Turtle Wildlife Sanctuary (TWS), the world’s only protected area dedicated to freshwater turtles, is now set to be wiped off the conservation map of India. The state government has submitted a proposal to the Government of India asking for the Kachhua sanctuary in Varanasi to be ‘denotified’ following a meeting of the State Board of Wildlife of Uttar Pradesh on August 30, 2018.

https://thewire.in/environment/in-modis-constituency-a-wildlife-sanctuary-is-quietly-being-erased