Chennai, Nov 2( BPNS)
Two villages in Sivaganga district of Tamil Nadu, Kollukudpatti and Vettangudipatti will not be bursting firecrackers during the Deepavali season. The villages have been shying away from bursting crackers for Deepavali for the past few decades. The reason, not to disturb the migratory birds that reach the Vettangudi bird sanctuary in this area spread over 31 hectares.
Sugunandan, a panchayath member of Kollukudipatti panchayath while speaking to BPNS said, “Our elders had told us not to burst crackers during Deepavali as the sound would disturb the migratory birds that land here. We are carrying on the tradition which has been in practice here for several decades and there is nothing new in this.”
While governments and pollution departments are conducting awareness programmes against the use of high decibel crackers, people in remote villages inside Madura- Tiruppatur highway are shying away on their own from bursting crackers.
Forest range officer Mathivannan while speaking to BPNS said, “The people of these two villages have not been bursting crackers for the past few decades and this has been due to the fact that the feathered guests are special guests and that they are treated as ‘God’.”
The forest officer also said that around 15000 birds belonging to 23 species from Sri Lanka, Maldives, China, and Myanmar arrive at the bird sanctuary and they stay in the sanctuary for four months for nesting, hatching, and fledging.
Several varieties of birds like egrets, heron, open bills stork, Indian white eye, water hen, black-headed ibis are some of the varieties of birds that have arrived at the Vettangudi bird sanctuary this season, Mathivannan said.
Panchayath member Sugunandan said that even children are not interested in bursting the firecrackers in the area so that the feathered guests are not disturbed.
