Anamalai Tiger Reserve

GS PAPER II: Conservation, environmental pollution and degradation, environmental impact assessment.

Context: Residents of two tribal settlements within the limits of the Anamalai Tiger Reserve (ATR), around 100 km off Coimbatore city, were gearing up for the annual festival of their local deity, Vairapattan.

The Kattupatti and Kuzhipatti settlements of Pulayar community have barely heard of the acronym COVID-19.

Anamalai Tiger Reserve

• Aanaimalai Tiger Reserve, earlier known as Indira Gandhi Wildlife Sanctuary and National Park (IGWLS&NP) and previously as Aanaimalai Wildlife Sanctuary, is a protected area located in the Anaimalai Hills of Tamil Nadu, India.
• The IGWS has significant anthropological diversity with more than 4600 Adivasi people from six tribes of indigenous people living in 34 settlements.
• The tribes are the Kadars, Malasars, Malaimalasar s, Pulaiyars, Muduvars and the Eravallan (Eravalar).
• It lies South of the Palakkad gap in the Southern Western Ghats.
• The Anamalai Tiger Reserve falls within the Western Ghats mountain chain of South West India, a region designated as one of 25 Global Biodiversity Hotspots.

https://www.thehindu.com/news/cities/Coimbatore/coronavirus-for-tribes-in-tamil-nadus-anamalai-its-still-an-urban-blight/article34499883.ece