In the crevices of boulders and beneath the rustle of leaf litter in the hills of the Eastern Ghats in Odisha and Andhra Pradesh lives a tiny population of the strikingly-patterned Jeypore ground gecko, which was presumed extinct for 130 years until it was rediscovered in 2010 by an Indian scientist.
Just four individuals of this endangered species have been documented in the past year in Odisha’s Balda hills, worryingly, within the site of a proposed bauxite mining project by an Adani-linked group. One of the least studied reptiles in the country, this gecko’s behaviour, habits and lifecycle continue to elude scientists. “Anything that threatens their habitat is the major risk. Agarwal. Another endemic species likely to be found in the region is the Araku worm gecko, he added.
Later, happily for the herpetologists, there were more sightings: one in 2025, and three this year, including one this month. And today, the spectre of Adani’s opencast bauxite mine proposal, covering 147 hectares of forest in the Balda hills, within the Nageswari reserve forest, threatens the very future of this vulnerable species. Ecologist Ishan Agarwal, who rediscovered this gecko in the Eastern Ghats in 2010, said that the gecko is “an ecologically and biogeographically significant species having split from its closest relatives over 20 million years ago. This is a relatively range-restricted species that is only found in high-elevation (900–1,400 metres) forests in the northern Eastern Ghats.
Coffee [though we don’t understand to what extent], hydel, mining are all potential threats,” he told The Hindu . The Balda hills are a treasure-trove of biodiversity and host a unique assemblage of species, including the unique limbless amphibian, Gegeneophis orientalis , said Dr. The Jeypore ground gecko is a “flagship species of the area,” said the renowned herpetologist Romulus Whitaker and added that the proposed mining project will most definitely see the end of the habitat of this important species, as well as others, including some yet undescribed. “I strongly advise against the mining of bauxite in the Balda hills and insist on prioritising the conservation of biodiversity of the area, in particular the Jeypore ground gecko,” Mr. Whitaker said in a release.
