Toughening its stand against the Union and State governments over the Gadgil and Kasturirangan panel reports on Western Ghats, the Paschima Ghatta Jana Samrakshana Samithi has urged the Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF) to issue the final notification in favour of the people living in the high range regions, before the general elections are declared. In a press release issued here after the meeting of the committee held at Thamarassery the other day, it asked the Union Government to immediately issue the draft notification by exempting populated areas, farm lands, plantations and buffer zones that had been recommended as ecologically sensitive in the Gadgil and Kasturirangan reports. The meeting further warned that if the government failed to issue a notification by exempting the anti-people recommendations in the reports, people would realise that both the Union and state governments were against the people living in the high ranges. “We will be forced to take a stand against the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government at the Centre and as such the Paschima Ghatta Jana Samrakshana Samithi would take a stand against the UPA candidates in the forthcoming Parliament elections,” the statement said. As part of intensifying the protests, the committee has also decided to launch a village-level indefinite hunger strike in front of the District Collectorate in Kozhikode from Tuesday.