Ramsar sites in India

Madhav National Park, in Madhya Pradesh, became a Tiger Reserve in 2025, and Sakhya Sagar inside it is a Ramsar site.

1. 1 is right: Madhav was declared a Tiger Reserve in 2025.
2. 2 is right: Sakhya Sagar, a reservoir inside Madhav National Park, is one of India's Ramsar sites.
3. 3 is wrong, by UPSC's provisional key: Madhav National Park is in Madhya Pradesh.

Answer(b) 1 and 2

Check each pair against the State the site is in.

1. 1: Hokera Wetland is in Jammu and Kashmir, not Punjab: wrong.
2. 2: Renuka Wetland is in Himachal Pradesh: right.
3. 3: Rudrasagar Lake is in Tripura: right.
4. 4: Sasthamkotta Lake is in Kerala, not Tamil Nadu: wrong.

Answer(b) Only two pairs

Kidneys clean the blood; wetlands clean the water.

1. (d) is the cleaning: aquatic plants take up heavy metals and excess nutrients, and the water leaves cleaner.
2. (a), (b) and (c) describe the water cycle, the food base and the soil, not cleaning.

Answer(d) Aquatic plants absorb heavy metals and excess nutrients.

Ramsar asks for at least one site and wise use, not the protection of every wetland.

1. 1 is wrong: the Convention asks each member to designate at least one wetland and to promote wise use "as far as possible" (Articles 2.4 and 3.1). Protecting all wetlands is not mandatory.
2. 2 is wrong, by UPSC's final key. The Central Government published the 2010 Rules (G.S.R. 951(E), 4 December 2010); the 2017 Rules that replaced them were made under the Environment (Protection) Act, 1986.
3. 3 is right, by UPSC's final key: the 2010 Rules also covered a wetland's drainage area or catchment, as the authority decided. (The 2017 Rules define a wetland's zone of influence as part of its catchment.)

Answer(c) 3 only

1. MoEFCC began a national wetlands programme in 1986 to help States carry out management plans for priority wetlands.
2. It now runs as the National Plan for Conservation of Aquatic Ecosystems (NPCA), which merged the lake and wetland programmes into one scheme; updated NPCA Guidelines came in 2024.
3. It works with the Wetlands (Conservation and Management) Rules, 2017, under which State and UT Wetland Authorities manage wetlands.
4. Comment: the network grew from 26 Ramsar sites in 2014 to 103, but listing is not management. Keoladeo and Loktak are still on the Montreux Record; Chilika shows restoration can work (off the Record in 2002).
5. Ramsar sites: Chilika Lake (Odisha), Keoladeo National Park (Rajasthan), Sundarban Wetland (West Bengal, the largest), Loktak Lake (Manipur), Wular Lake (Jammu and Kashmir).

1. Define: a wetland is any area of marsh, fen, peatland or water, natural or artificial, permanent or temporary, fresh, brackish or salt, including marine water no deeper than 6 metres at low tide (Ramsar Convention, Article 1.1).
2. Wise use is the Convention's core idea: sustainable use of wetlands, so that people benefit while the wetland's ecological character is kept.
3. In practice: national laws and plans for all wetlands, not only Ramsar sites. In India, the Wetlands Rules, 2017 ban encroachment, solid waste dumping and untreated effluents, and State Wetland Authorities manage wetlands.
4. Example 1: Chilika Lake (Odisha), one of India's first two Ramsar sites (1981), taken off the Montreux Record in 2002 after restoration.
5. Example 2: Keoladeo National Park (Rajasthan), India's other first site, a waterbird habitat, still on the Montreux Record.
6. Close with wise use at work: the East Kolkata Wetlands treat the city's wastewater naturally through fish ponds.