Godrej Flays Development in National Parks

Mumbai, Feb 18 (PTI) Industrialist Nadir Godrej on Wednesday flayed the decision to carry out development works at National Parks, pitching instead for "monetisation" by nurturing biodiversity through activities like tourism.

The chairman of Godrej Industries also went public with his concerns on pollution, pointing out that 60 per cent of Indians are grappling with the issue, and wondering why we are unable to address the problem.

Recalling that his uncle was associated with the Project Tiger that is widely credited for increasing the big cat population in India, Godrej spoke against "damage" to national parks.

"People are trying to damage national parks for the sake of development. I don't think that is a good idea. Lets have development but without damaging the national parks," he said while speaking at the Mumbai Climate Week here.

Making it clear that he is not against monetisation, he urged for more efforts to popularise tourism and using the jungles for other aspects like forest products, pointing out that his company procures some oils from forest produce.


"There are lots of ways of monetising biodiversity. But we must be very careful that we preserve the biodiversity while we monetise it," he said.

The remarks come amid a raging controversy over the Maharashtra government decision to allow iron ore mining in tiger corridor near the Tadoba Reserve by having an open-cast mine.

Pollution is leading to loss of life, impacting its longevity or damaging the quality of life for 60 per cent of Indians at present, Godrej said, expressing a shock that presence of sea has not helped the city.

"I think we all need to speak up," the septuagenarian said, pointing out that other cities in the world, like Los Angeles and Beijing, have solved the problem.

There is no single authority to tackle the problem of pollution, he said, suggesting a GST-like structure between the Centre and states to tackle the problem.