Gadag: The Forest department received a set back, when the state government after a year of deliberations, dropped its proposal to give the protected tag as  wildlife sanctuary to the  Kappatagudda hills in Gadag. In 2009, the Western Ghats Task Force proposed to the State Wildlife Board to declare 300 sq km of the forest area as a wildlife sanctuary.
At its meeting on March 15, 2013, the sub-committee of the board concluded that it was appropriate to declare Kappatagudda a wildlife sanctuary, and a proposal was submitted to the government to declare 221.82 sq km of forest area as Kappatagudda Wildlife Sanctuary.

The mining lobby  however is jubilant as it is one the areas they would like to explore. Environmentalists on the other hand had been demanding steps to protect Kappatagudda, which is better known as the Western Ghats of north Karnataka

The Additional Secretary, Department of Forest, Ecology and Environment has, in a recent letter, attributed this decision to opposition from the local people and the impact on livelihoods.

Condemning the government’s decision, the former chairman of the Western Ghats Task Force Anant Hegde Asisar said that the State was “succumbing to pressure from the mining lobby”.