Over 20,000 tourists throng Kaas Plateau in three days, poor planning causes traffic jams

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Thousands of tourists flocked to Satara's Kaas Plateau, a world heritage site, to see the flowers during the three consecutive holidays of Saturday, Sunday and Anant Chaturdashi, but arrangements were thrown into complete disarray due to incomplete planning by the forest department and the Kaas Van Samiti. A lack of proper parking arrangements and insufficient preparation caused needless trouble for thousands of tourists.

Online bookings for three thousand tourists, reserved in advance for the three days, were already full. Despite this, a large number of tourists arrived directly at the plateau all at once. These unexpected visitors took offline tickets to enter. With a crowd of more than twenty thousand tourists gathering over three days, the plateau took on the look of a fairground.

The forest department and the Van Samiti paid no attention at all to ensuring that such a large group of tourists arriving over three days would face no trouble, which led to a major traffic jam. Parking space fell short, while long queues of tourists formed to enter the area with the flowers.

At present, the red-pink terda flowers are blooming well on Kaas Plateau, giving the entire plateau a look filled with red, pink, blue and purple colours. Along with this, some rare insectivorous flower species such as Mickey Mouse, Kandil Pushpa, Sonki, Chavar, Gend, blue-purple Manjiri and Panchgani Amri have also been spotted on the plateau this time.

White lotuses have also started blooming in the famous Kumudini lake, which is drawing crowds of tourists there as well. Since Kumudini lake, located near the highway, is a little far off, electric vehicles have been provided to reach it. Tourists are making the trip by electric vehicle after buying tickets priced at one hundred rupees per person. Several new points developed this year are also seeing good crowds, with a new tourist spot called Mandapghal particularly attracting visitors.

On the other hand, rain has stopped completely for the last fifteen days, raising the risk that the flowers on Kaas Plateau will have a shorter life. Kaas Plateau is formed of rock, with very little soil, which means it cannot retain moisture for long. With the rain having stopped and strong sunlight, the risk of the plateau's biodiversity drying up quickly has increased. This is why it is being suggested that the flowers on the plateau may end earlier than usual this time.

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