Context: Three States have commenced joint action to stop illegal sand mining in National Chambal Sanctaury.
About National Chambal Sanctuary
- National Chambal Sanctuary, also called the National Chambal Gharial Wildlife Sanctuary.
- It is located on the Chambal River near the tripoint of Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh.
- It was first declared in Madhya Pradesh in 1978, and now constitutes a long narrow eco-reserve co-administered by the three states.
- It is listed as an important bird area (IBA) and is a proposed Ramsar site.
- Fauna: It is a protected area for the protection of the Critically Endangered gharial, the red-crowned roof turtle and the Endangered Ganges river dolphin. Other large threatened inhabitants of the sanctuary include mugger crocodile, smooth-coated otter, striped hyena and Indian wolf. Chambal supports 8 of the 26 rare turtle species found in India, including Indian narrow-headed softshell turtle, three-striped roof turtle and crowned river turtle.
- Flora: Common plants in the sanctuary include khair, palash, Indian elm tree, Indian plum etc. It is part of the Khathiar-Gir dry deciduous forests ecoregion.
About Chambal River
- It rises in the Vindhya Range just south of Mhow, western Madhya Pradesh state.
- It is a second biggest tributary of the Yamuna River in Central and Northern India, and thus forms part of the drainage system of the Ganges.
- The river flows through Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh. It also forms part of the Rajasthan-Madhya Pradesh boundary.
- The main tributaries of Chambal include the Banas and Mej rivers on the left and the Parbati, Kali Sindh and Shipra rivers on the right.
- The Chambal’s lower course is lined by belt of badland gullies resulting from accelerated soil erosion.
