Mangaluru : Sahyadri Sanchaya samithi, who staged a protest to save the Western Ghats here on Tuesday, urged the government to constitute an authority for the conservation of rivers, particularly the Netravati, in the State.

Sahyadri Sanchaya, a registered body, organised the protest in front of the Deputy Commissioner’s office.

Speaking on the occasion Dinesh Holla, the convener of the sanchaya, said that many States in the country, except Karnataka, had river conservation authorities that held the responsibility of preventing the abuse of rivers and their conservation. The State government should set up such an authority here.

Mr. Holla, who has often trekked in the Western Ghats, said that timber, mining, ganja, resorts, estates and the hunting mafia were destroying the Western Ghats. The Netravati, the lifeline of Dakshina Kananda, was already under threat by the Yettinahole project which was destroying the ecology of the ghats.

He said that now, the State government was examining whether it could lift Netravati water by constructing a reservoir in the mouth of the river where it joins the sea. A scientist from the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bengaluru, made a presentation on the same to the State government recently.

Mr. Holla said that the Netravati has already dried up. After damaging the origin of water sources of the Netravati the government is now planning to damage the ecology where the same river joins the sea.