Forest officers detained 12 foreign tourists who were climbing the 2,500 feet Tiruvannamalai hill, despite restrictions on doing so, on Thursday morning. They were let off with a warning.
According to a forest officer, seven men and five women from Lithuania were on a tour to India and had visited pilgrimage centres like Haridwar. Two days ago, they reached Tiruvannamalai. Around 3.30 a.m, the tourists started climbing the hill. Upon receiving information, Kiruba Shankar, District Forest Officer (DFO), Tiruvannamalai directed the ranger S. Manoharan and team to stop them. “We also climbed the hill and managed to stop them around 5.30 a.m mid-way up the hill,” said the officer.
The tourists told officials that as it was early in the morning, they did not notice the notice boards that inform people not to climb the hill. “The guides, who know about the restrictions, take money and take them up the hill. A few months ago one such guide was nabbed and fined ₹25,000,” the officer said. The DFO warned the tourists not to commit such blunders and left them. “In two different incidents this year we saved a man from Hyderabad and Russia who were stranded on the hill. It is a very risky climb. From last Karthigai Deepam, we have banned people from climbing the hill,” he said. Notice boards have been kept around the hill preventing people from climbing it, he added.
