Environment and Disaster Management › Protected areas and habitats
हिन्दी — Read in HindiWetlands and Ramsar sites
Wetlands and lakes as places: what a listing changes, encroachment, and the floodplains that decide their fate. Prelims has matched wetlands to their States and asked what the Montreux Record implies.
Foundation note: Wetlands: the Rules, Ramsar and the Montreux Record
UPSC has asked
- Prelims 2022: matching named wetlands with their States
- Prelims 2022: the wetland function that makes wetlands the kidneys of the Earth
All 2 articles shown; the 0 that changed from 1 to 30 September 2026 are marked.Show only these
India's Ramsar sites
Copy link to India's Ramsar sitesPrelims and Mains
A Ramsar site listing commits a country to the wise use of a wetland: it is a promise about how the wetland will be used rather than a fence around it.
- It is not by itself a protection order under Indian law, so what it changes on the ground depends entirely on Indian law.
- Domestic protection comes from the Wetlands (Conservation and Management) Rules and from whatever protected area category the wetland happens to fall inside.
- India has 101 Ramsar sites, against 24 in 2014.
What changed
3 Aug 2026New
- Glaw Lake was designated India's 101st Ramsar site, and Arunachal Pradesh's first.
- It lies inside the Kamlang Tiger Reserve and Wildlife Sanctuary in the Eastern Himalaya, fed by perennial mountain streams.
PIB, 3 Aug 2026: Glaw Lake becomes India's 101st Ramsar site (opens in a new tab)
UPSC has asked
- Prelims 2019: the Ramsar Convention and the Wetlands (Conservation and Management) Rules, 2010
Mining buffers around wetland reserves
Copy link to Mining buffers around wetland reservesPrelims and Mains
A mining buffer is a belt around a protected area inside which mining needs prior approval.
- Unlike a national park or a sanctuary, a conservation reserve or community reserve carries no statutory buffer zone of its own.
- The Supreme Court has been closing that gap one order at a time.
- Activity that needs clearing near such an area goes to the Standing Committee of the National Board for Wildlife, the Environment Ministry, or both.
What changed
5 Aug 2026New
- The Supreme Court clarified orally that its 2024 order on the Asan Wetland Conservation Reserve was never about Asan alone.
- Mining within 10 km of any wetland conservation reserve or community reserve in the country now needs prior approval before it can begin.
- Asan, where the Asan meets the Yamuna in Uttarakhand, has been a Ramsar site since 2020.
The Hindu, 5 Aug 2026: Supreme Court says 10 km radius buffer for mining extends to all wetland reserves (opens in a new tab) · The Hindu, 7 Aug 2026: How will the Supreme Court order impact mining around Ramsar wetland sites? | Explained (opens in a new tab)
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