Supreme Court tells Jharkhand to notify Saranda sanctuary

A bench of Chief Justice of India (CJI) Bhushan R Gavai and Justice K Vinod Chandran said the notification must be issued within three months, covering 31,468.25 hectares of pristine forest—home to some of the world’s finest Sal trees and a rich array of wildlife— in West Singhbhum district. It clarified that essential public infrastructure like schools, dispensaries, and road and rail lines would remain protected, and directed the state to publicise this fact to allay fears among tribal and forest-dwelling communities.

The order makes Saranda the first sanctuary in India to be notified on the direction of the Supreme Court. The bench relied on a 1968 Bihar government notification declaring the area as Saranda Game Sanctuary under the then Bihar Forest, Hunting, Shooting and Fishing Rules, 1958.

The court excluded six forest compartments from the sanctuary’s limits for mining, but made it clear that no mining activity can take place in the remaining area or within the one-kilometre eco-sensitive zone around it, reiterating its April 2023 judgment in the batch of TN Godavarman cases. In that ruling, the court had held that mining “within a national park or wildlife sanctuary and within one kilometre from its boundary shall not be permissible,” expanding what was then a Goa-specific restriction to the entire country.