dehradun ahead of mahashivratri the influx of kanwariyas to collect water from the ganga in haridwar has begun a number of camps have been set up for them where they can rest and get food in bhandaras some of these camps have also been set up in the rasiyabad and shyampur ranges of haridwar forest division however the congregation of kanwariyas is resulting in a lot of garbage and food waste being littered in the area this has earned the ire of environmentalists who are questioning how permission to set up these arrangements were given by forest officials they allege that there is frequent movement of wild animals in the area especially elephants and the presence of litter and food waste might attract them leading to chances of mananimal conflictdinesh pandey wildlife activist said the animals are already disturbed on the highway 74 where many of them have been killed due to high speed vehciles and now inside the forest close to the road a bazar has mushroomed with a large number of stalls selling food and other items not only this open mass kitchens have been set up all to cater to hundreds of kanwariyas there is so much of noise and music blaring to disturb the animals and left over food polythene bags and debris to attract their attentionhe said in last few days the police had to stop the traffic of kanwariyas on foot and vehicles many times in last three days as few elephants are daily coming there at tedi puliya they come fascinated by the food and sugarcane piled up for juice the mela authority in haridwar should provide land to set up the stalls and mass kitchen for the kanwariyas in haridwar using reserve forest is completely illegal he said adding that the operators who bring pilgrims from outside charging heft fee from each of them strike a deal with the forest officials and hire the forest for relatively cheaper price than the one in the city however this price too runs into lakhs which are shared by the forest officialshe also questioned who is going to be responsible if animal attacked on human or anybody among the crowd hunt the animalshoff head of forest force rajinder mahajan expressed ignorance about the matter and said that he would enquire into the matter divisional forest official hk singh divisional forest official was not available for comment