Journalists, activists stress on stronger laws for environment protection

They underlined the need for stricter provisions in the Forest Conservation Act to ensure a higher degree of compliance.

A two-day virtual training programme on environmental management for media personnel concluded at the Central Academy for State Forest Service here on Friday with veteran journalist Ramesh Menon calling for a greater degree of sensitivity on the part of policy makers to environmental issues such as climate change.

"India is talking much about climate change but doing little about it," Menon, who was awarded the Ram Nath Goenka Award for environmental journalism in 2006, said during the valedictory session of the programme.

He said sustainable development was the only way out and that development and environmental conservation must go hand-in-hand.

Earlier, the speakers underlined the need for stricter provisions in the Forest Conservation Act to ensure a higher degree of compliance.

Saving forest land from its use for non-forest activities is the fundamental purpose of the Forest Conservation Act, and it needs to be made stricter through proposed amendments, environmental lawyer Ritwik Dutta said.

Dutta, a former secretary of the National Green Tribunal Bar Association, said it is deplorable that several states in India, including Bihar and Jharkhand, still do not have a policy defining forest land.

He also expressed concern over India's poor ranking in environmental management. India stands 186th among 189 countries in the list.