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Correspondent

21 August 2024 at 10:20:16 am

Broken Corridors

India likes to celebrate its growing tiger population as one of conservation’s great success stories. But tigers survive and thrive because their habitats remain connected. Fragmenting those forests entails risks for thriving tiger populations. The decision to grant an in-principle wildlife clearance for a third railway line through the Satpura-Melghat tiger corridor carries with it precisely that risk. The proposed railway line between Jujharpur and Chichonda cuts through one of central...

Broken Corridors

India likes to celebrate its growing tiger population as one of conservation’s great success stories. But tigers survive and thrive because their habitats remain connected. Fragmenting those forests entails risks for thriving tiger populations. The decision to grant an in-principle wildlife clearance for a third railway line through the Satpura-Melghat tiger corridor carries with it precisely that risk. The proposed railway line between Jujharpur and Chichonda cuts through one of central India’s most critical wildlife landscapes, linking the Satpura and Melghat tiger reserves and forming part of the larger Satpura-Pench-Melghat landscape. This corridor is a biological highway, allowing tigers and other wildlife to disperse, breed and maintain healthy genetic diversity. The Standing Committee of the National Board for Wildlife has insisted that mitigation measures such as wildlife overpasses be scientifically designed and reviewed before implementation. Yet the clearance itself exposes an unsettling contradiction. The committee’s own inspection found that the proposed 34 wildlife overpasses were based largely on field observations and mortality records rather than rigorous scientific assessment. Detailed engineering designs are still absent. Importantly, the comprehensive landscape study by the State Forest Research Institute, Jabalpur, is still awaited. The approval has been granted before the study is in. This reverses the basic principle that should govern projects in ecologically sensitive landscapes. Scientific evidence must guide approvals, not merely refine them after the fact. Once a project gathers administrative momentum, conditions often become exercises in compliance rather than conservation. There have been far too many examples where mitigation structures were inadequately designed, poorly located or inconsistently monitored, leaving wildlife to bear the consequences. The danger extends beyond tigers. The Satpura-Melghat landscape supports leopards, sloth bears, wild dogs, gaur and countless smaller species that depend on uninterrupted forests. Railways have already emerged as a significant source of wildlife mortality across India. Faster trains, higher traffic density and expanding rail infrastructure multiply these risks, especially where animal movement corridors intersect transport networks. None of this argues against development. India’s expanding economy requires better freight movement and modern transport infrastructure. But development ceases to be sustainable when it treats ecological safeguards as hurdles instead of foundations. While a railway can be built, a forest corridor, once fragmented, cannot simply be reconstructed through concrete overpasses and engineering optimism. India has spent decades and enormous public resources restoring tiger habitats and expanding protected areas. Allowing critical corridors to shrink through piecemeal clearances would squander those gains. The Satpura-Melghat corridor is the artery through which one of India’s finest wildlife landscapes continues to breathe. That said, if the government gets the balance between development and conversation right, this project could well become a model for reconciling economic ambition with ecological responsibility.

Constitution does not support forced or fraudulent religious conversion: Allahabad HC

  • PTI
  • May 19, 2025
  • 2 min read


PRAYAGRAJ: Allahabad High Court has observed that though the Indian Constitution gives every citizen the right to freely follow and spread their religion, it does not support forced or fraudulent conversions.


Justice Vinod Diwaker made the observation while rejecting a plea to cancel an FIR against four people accused under the Uttar Pradesh Prohibition of Unlawful Religious Conversion Act, 2021.


According to the complaint, the accused tried to convert people to Christianity by offering money and free medical care.


The court refused to cancel the case, stating that the charges were serious and valid enough for police investigation.


In its judgment, the court observed, "India's constitutional framework guarantees the right to religious freedom under Article 25.


This Article confers upon every person the fundamental right to freely profess, practise and propagate religion, subject to public order, morality and health.

The use of the word 'freely' in Article 25 underscores the voluntary nature of religious belief and expression."


"However, the Constitution does not endorse forced or fraudulent conversions, nor does it shield coercive or deceptive practices under the guise of religious propagation," it added.


The court maintained that these limitations are essential to ensure that the exercise of religious freedom does not disrupt the societal fabric or endanger individual and communal well-being.


"The presumption that one religion is inherently superior to other clearly presupposes the moral and spiritual superiority of one religion over another.

Such notion is fundamentally antithetical to the idea of secularism.


Indian secularism is rooted in the principle of equal respect for all religions.

The state must neither identify with nor favour any religion, but instead maintain a principled equidistance from all religions and faith," the ruling said.


Commenting on the 2021 Act prohibiting unlawful religious conversion brought in by the Uttar Pradesh government, the court stated that it was enacted to maintain public order, moral integrity and health in alignment with Article 25 of the Constitution.


"The primary object of the Act is to prohibit conversions from one religion to another that are carried out through misrepresentation, force, undue influence, coercion, allurement, fraudulent means or marriage for the sole purpose of unlawful conversion.


By targeting such methods, the law seeks to prevent exploitation and manipulation that could have broader destabilising effects on social harmony, besides disruption of law and order," the ruling said.


The May 7 judgment also looked into a legal issue as to whether a police officer can be considered an "aggrieved person" under Section 4 of the 2021 Act.


This section generally allows only the victim or close relatives to file a complaint.


The bench clarified that the station house officer can file such FIRs because the law must be read with the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita provisions that allow the police to act in cognizable offences.

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